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Oass—L 6 3 4 ? ,. 
Book L_ 



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AN INTRODUCTION 



HERBART'S SCIENCE AND PRACTICE 
OF EDUCATION 



BY 

HENRY M. AND EMMIE FELKIN 



With a Preface by 
OSCAR BROWNING, M.A. 

Fellow of King's College, Cambridge 



BOSTON, U.S.A. 
PUBLISHED BY D. C. HEATH & CO. 

1S95 






Transfer 
Engineers School Li by. 
June 29,1931 



PREFACE 

In 1892 Mr. and Mrs. Felkin published a translation of Herbart's 
Science of Education and The ^Esthetic Revelation of the World, 
to which I contributed a preface. The book has been well 
received, and adopted as a text book by the University of 
Cambridge and other educational bodies. The same writers 
now increase the debt which is due to them from all advocates 
of scientific educational training by publishing the present 
Introduction to Herbart 1 s Science and Practice of Education. 
The object of the book is to answer a question which many 
students of education are now asking : Who is Herbart ? and 
what did he and his followers teach ? It answers this question 
better than any other account of the Herbartian method hitherto 
published in English. It is difficult to exhibit adequately the 
educational views of Herbart by merely translating his works. 
Herbart's use of philosophical phraseology is peculiar, an<J it is 
scarcely possible for any one to comprehend the full meaning of 
his pedagogical precepts who has not grasped the scope of his 
philosophy as a whole, an enterprise for which few students 
of education have either time or opportunity. Besides this, the 
doctrines of Herbart, like those of Pestalozzi and Froebel, have 
been developed by a school of Herbartians to conclusions of 
which, perhaps, Herbart would have approved, but which are 
not easily discoverable in the text of his writings. The 
Herbartian doctrine is not simply Herbart; it has been con- 
verted into a body of practice. So, while Mr. and Mrs. Felkin 
have devoted the first chapter of their work' to an account 
of Herbart's psychology and the second to an account of his 
ethics, they add to their admirable presentation of Herbart's 
own views on practical teaching a description of the methods 
of modern German teachers who call themselves " Herbartians." 
The book does not attempt more than this. It is an excellent 
descriptive account of one of the most important pedagogic 
schools which sprang out of the school of Pestalozzi. If some 
parts of this account are more satisfactory than others, it is not 



vi Preface 

the fault of the authors. Herbart's own treatment of the ques- 
tions of government and discipline is not very satisfactory, 
nor are the difficulties inherent in them cleared up by his 
successors. If Mr. and Mrs. Felkin fail in this department 
to carry conviction to English readers, it is because those who 
preceded them have failed also. 

As it is no part of the province of this book to criticise the 
doctrines of which it gives an account, such a criticism can- 
not be expected from the writer of the Preface. He would, 
however, venture to say, as a practical schoolmaster of some 
experience, that the part of the Herbartian doctrine which 
carries least conviction to his mind is that of the concentra- 
tion centres and the historical culture epochs. Any uniformity 
in curricula is, so far as it goes, a hindrance to good education. 
The faculties of the mind do not develop in the same order in 
different individuals. The mmd in the child and in the young 
man is always growing, and at a certain normal age it may be 
considered to be mature ; but some minds have developed 
quickly, Others tardily ; and, besides this general difference, the 
tastes for different pursuits at different ages are strongly marked. 
Curricula naturally take but little note of this divergence. 
They assume the existence of a normal growth, the same for 
all. Just in proportion as the curriculum to which the learner 
is subject is rigid and uniform, so would it fail to be applicable 
to a large number of students. An ideal education would be 
different for every child, because the growths of no two minds 
are the same. Circumstances may force us to compromise, but 
we should take care that our compromise gains as much for us 
and loses as little as possible. 

In conclusion I may express my conviction that the present 
book will prove a most welcome addition to the comparatively 
small number of works on the scientific study of education 
which exist in the English language. 

OSCAR BROWNING, 

Director of the Cambridge University Day Training College 
and Secretary to the Teachers' Training Syndicate. 
King's College, Cambridge, 
May, 1895. 



AUTHORS' PREFATORY NOTE 

To Mr. Oscar Browning we and our readers are a second 
time indebted for a preface to a work on Herbart, and we 
gladly take this opportunity of cordially thanking him. 
Our sincere acknowledgments are also due to Prof. James 
Sully for his kindness in revising the passages on Her- 
bart's use of the term " soul " ; to Miss K. M. Clarke for 
revision of part of the manuscript and for many valuable 
suggestions ; to Dr. Hermann Fehse, of the Real-Gym- 
nasium, Chemnitz, for his careful revision of some of the 
proofs ; and to Herr Geheimerath Muller, the reviser of 
Hartenstein's edition of Herbart's works for the German 
press, for ready help and interest in the work. 

Chemnitz, Saxony, 
April 17th, 1895. 



CONTENTS 

PAGE 

Preface by Mr. Oscar Browning; v 

Authors' Prefatory Note . . vii 

INTRODUCTION. 

Aim of the work and reasons for undertaking it .... 1 

Spread of Herbartian literature and principles of education . . 2 
Difficulties in the adoption of his system by the elementary and 

secondary schools of Germany 4 

Herbart the first to base education directly on ethics and psycho- 
logy :.-..■ • • 7 

The three main divisions of the subject ...... 7 

(1) Pedagogy, or the science and art of education. 

(2) Ethics: its aim. 

(3) Psychology : its means. 

CHAPTEE I.— Psychology. 

Education : its possibility, need, importance, justification, motive, 

work, and aim 11 

Herbart's use of the term " soul " 13 

The human entity and its endowments, analyzed as an object of 

education 15 

Factors conditioning the teacher's power 17 

The senses, the medium for education 17 

The three activities of the soul: presentation; feeling; willing . 19 
Presentations: their origin, classification, law r s, varieties, move- 
ments, reproduction, and interaction 19 

Memory of three kinds: rational, ingenious, and mechanical . 30 

Suppressed presentations ; abstract presentations .... 32 

Psychical and logical concepts ........ 33 

Importance of forming an interconnected circle of thought . . 34 

The process of apperception defined 36 

Involuntary apperceptive attention 38 

Voluntary apperceptive attention . . . . . .39 

Feelings and desires analyzed and classified as secondary states 

of the soul 40 

Herbart's distinction between sensations and feelings ... 43 

Formal feelings ; expectation 45 

Qualitative feelings ; sympathy . 47 

Desire defined 48 

„ dependent on the presentations 51 

„ leading to will 51 

„ differentiated from feeling 51 

„ distinction between, and will 52 

„ passing into will 52 



Contents 



CHAPTER II.— Ethics. 

PAGE 

Herbart's definition of ethics 54 

The good will 55 

The formation of will by insight, the work of education . . 56 

The circle of thought as the soui ce of will 57 

Motives, the two classes of, which influence the will ... 58 

Intuitive judgments 59 

Ethical judgments developed by the relationships of the will , 61 

The five practical (moral) ideas 62 

Two wills in one person, objective and subjective .... 62 

The first moral idea : inner freedom 63 

„ second „ perfection 65 

„ third „ benevolence 66 

„ fourth „ right 70 

„ fifth „ equity 72 

The five ideas classified as formal or material 73 

„ „ „ combined supply the concept morality ... 73 

The five derived (sociological) ideas 74 

Ethics in relation to religion 75 

Religion needful to morality 75 

„ Herbart's conception of 76 

„ in its relation to the child .78 



CHAPTER III.— Practical Pedagogy. 

Section 1. — Theory ef Instruction. 

Formation of character the aim of education 80 

Instruction and discipline as means of education .... 81 

Educative instruction 81 

Experience and intercourse as teaching the child before attending 

school 82 

The child's store of thought to be examined 82 

The child's store of experience and intercourse arranged and 

extended 83 

Presentative instruction depends on apperception .... 84 

Experience and intercourse to be used throughout instruction . 84 

Instruction, the two lines of 85 

analytic ; synthetic 85, 86 

„ example of, based on experience 86 

„ „ intercourse 88 

The child's mind must be analyzed to itself 88 

Instruction must supplement experience and intercourse . . 89 

Significance of educative instruction 89 

Nature of many-sided interest 90 

Interest, receptive and apperceptive, compared 91 

apperceptive, as influencing formation of character . . 93 

Herbart's definition of .94 

far-reaching . 94 

immediate 94 

many-sided 95 



Contents xi 



Many-sided interest arising from knowledge is — 

(1) Empirical, with illustrations 96 

(2) Speculative „ ...... 96 

(3) Esthetic „ 96 

Many-sided interest arising from sympathy is — 

(1) Sympathetic 97 

(2) Social 97 

(3) Eeligious . 97 

Interest, illustrations to, arising from sympathy .... 97 

„ an illustration to the six classes of 98 

„ "balanced 100 

„ the motive power in education 101 

„ how created 102 

Section 2.— Treatment of the Material of Instruction. 

Classification of the material of instruction 105 

Theory of the formal steps ........ 105 

Method units 106 

„ the aim of . . 106 

The five steps according to Herbart and Eein 107 

First formal step : preparation 108 

Second „ presentation Ill 

Third „ association^ , .113 

Fourth „ recapitulation 115 

Fifth „ application ........ 116 

Principle of the formal steps- not new 118 

Example of a lesson according to the five formal steps . . . 118 

Section 3. — Selection of the Material of Instruction ; Dual Theory 
of the Concentration Centres and Historical Culture Epochs. 

Material, the selection of, discussed ....... 121 

„ principle of its selection, as formulated by Ziller . . 122 

The eight historical culture epochs 123 

Instruction, humanistic and scientific, must be connected . . 123 

Humanistic material to be made the concentration centres . . 124 

Concentration material, principles for the selection of . 124 

„ „ epic fairy tales for the first year . . 125 

„ „ Robinson Crusoe for the second year . . 126 

„ „ for the third and successive years . . 127 

Parallel material from German history attached to the centres . 128 

The dual theory, general remarks on . . . > . . . 129 

„ „ a curriculum based on 130 

„ „ difficulties in the practical working out of . 130 
Eeligious material as concentration centres discussed in the light 

of Herbart's ethical aim . 132 



Section 4. 
Yoigt's criticism on the dual theory as applied to instruction in 

elementary schools 136 

Section 5. 
Examples of lessons based on the dual theory of the concentra- 

tration centres and historical culture epochs .... 145 



xii Contents 



CHAPTER IV. — Moral Strength of Character ; Government and 

Discipline. 
Section 1, — Government. 

PAGE 

Insight alone insufficient to form the will 155 

Discipline used for the direct formation of character . . . 156 

Government, the aim of 156 

„ measures employed by — 

(1) Occupation 157 

(2) Supervision 157 

(3) Threatening 158 

(4) Punishment 158 

Reasoning with little children 159 

Herbarfs view of corporal punishments 160 

Authority and love to guide the measures of government . . 161 

Section 2. — Discipline. 

Discipline, the aim of 162 

„ and government, contrast between 162 

„ must help to form a moral will 163 

The principle of apperception applied to formation of will . . 163 

Action of disparate presentations in the formation of will . . 165 

Memory of the will : its conditions 166 

Will apperception : its conditions and results 167 

" Maxims," Herbart's use of the term 167 

The subjective part of character the growth of later years . . 168 

The objective „ „ „ earlier „ . . 168 

Desires and their regulation by discipline 169 

The personality of the teacher 172 

Approbation and blame 172 

The joint work of instruction and discipline on character . . 173 

Discipline, relation of, to interest 174 

„ measures of 174 

CHAPTER V. — The Relationship and Debt of Herbart to 

Pestalozzi ....... 176 

CHAPTER VI. — Conclusion : Some Aspects of Herbart's Work 

and Character 184 



AN INTRODUCTION TO HERBART'S 
SCIENCE AND PRACTICE OF EDUCATION 



tl Die erste und wichtigste aller Fragen, welche der Mensch 
fiir sich, fur Andere, ftir den Staat, fur die Erziehung, fiir die 
Welt, ja sogar in Bazug auf Vorsehimg und Erlosung aufwerfen 
kann, ist die Frage nach der Moglichkeit des Besserwerdens." 

— Hebbart. 



INTRODUCTION 



In 1892, with a view to making Herbart's principles better 
known in England and America, we published a translation 
into English of his Allgemeine Padagogik, or Science of 
Education, 1 and with it his short treatise on the JEsthetic 
Revelation of the World. From private communications and 
many reviews of this translation we gather that although it 
has been received with much interest and found many careful 
readers, some difficulty has been experienced by even thought- 
ful educationists in understanding various parts of Herbart's 
system, and at times in getting at his real meaning. This is 
not surprising. Even to German educationists Herbart is a 
difficult writer, requiring patience and study. The difficulty to 
an English reader arises from the fact that the whole tone of 
thought is new and strange, the terminology is unknown to 
him, and the knowledge assumed which forms the basis upon 
which the science is built up, is mostly wanting, or wanting 
in the form and connection required by Herbart. Ufer, 
an educationist himself and one of Herbart's best popular 
expositors, whose work Vorschule der Padagogik HerbarVs 
we shall make free use of in the following pages, refers in his 
introduction to this initial difficulty in the study of Herbart. 
" The reader," he says, " can easily imagine how I plagued 
myself uselessly when he remembers Herbart's peculiar use of 
language, and further considers that there are many parts of 
Herbart's pedagogy which cannot be understood by those who 
are not acquainted with the auxiliary sciences in Herbartian 
form which underlie it." It was this same difficulty which 

1 Boston : D. C. Heath & Co. 



2 Introduction to Herbarfs Science and Practice of Education 

led him to write his valuable little work for those beginning 
the study of Herbart. 

In our introduction to the translation above mentioned, we 
gave a slight sketch of Herbart's uneventful life and important 
educational work, and attempted to supply the reader with 
some of this necessary preliminary knowledge as an aid to 
understanding the translation. But the space at our disposal 
was insufficient to give that fuller knowledge, especially of 
Herbart's psychology, which the reader requires to enter with 
interest and profit upon a study of his educational system. 
Our object, then, in the following pages, is to supply this pre- 
liminary need, to give the preparatory data sufficient to make 
the Science of Education comprehensible to a thoughtful 
reader or an intelligent teacher seeking help in his daily work. 
We shall not attempt to explain individually, or in the order in 
which they occur, the obscure passages and terms left undefined 
by Herbart ; our object will rather be to enable the student, 
after reading this preparatory sketch, to do so for himself. To 
this end we shall try to give an outline of Herbart's psychology, 
ethics, and pedagogy, supplying practical illustrations where 
such aid is necessary to render his meaning clearer. 

A friend once remarked that he never understood a sermon of 
Dr. Martineau's till he had heard the last word. The reader 
will have to exercise similar patience with Herbart, and often 
wait for the last word to illuminate the whole chapter. 

The materials have been partly gathered from the two works 
Herbart wrote as supplementary to the Padagogik, the one 
Umriss padagogischer Vorlesungen, published in 1835, the 
other Umriss der Allgemeinen Padagogik, which appeared four 
years later. For a few of the practical illustrations, for the 
general idea of the book, and for some of its material we are 
indebted to Ufer's work above mentioned. 1 

It is now more than half a century since Herbart's death, 
and the seed he spent his life in sowing is bearing fruit. His 
influence in Germany has rapidly extended during the last 

1 Charles Ufer, formerly teacher at Elberfeld and since 1886 teacher 
in the Higher Girls' School at Altenburg, in Saxony, where the 
instruction given is ba-s d .on Herbart's the ry. 



Introduction 



thirty years, and has spread into other countries. In Germany 
societies have been formed for promoting education on the lines 
of his educational principles, as well as for discussion and mutual 
help. The first of these, representing the Rhine districts and 
Westphalia, comprised over 400 members. Later on meetings 
were held in East Germany, and then in Bavaria and Wurtem- 
berg, for extending the work of the societies. Afterwards an 
important society was formed for Thuringia, and lastly another 
for Saxony. The Thuringian society has its headquarters 
at Jena, to whose university a school is attached, wherein 
Herbart's principles, as elaborated by Ziller and the modern 
school, are practically applied. . Prof. Rein, Lecturer on 
Pedagogy at the university, is president of this society and 
the acknowledged present leader of the modern Herbartian 
movement. The formation of this society for Middle Germany, 
with many affiliated sub-societies, which send delegates to the 
annual meeting, is a new proof of the rapidly increasing in- 
fluence of Herbart's principles. It holds its annual conference 
at Erfurt, and the first meeting in 1892 was attended by over 
2,000 educationists, when Prof. Rein was elected president of 
the council for three years. It has been stated by a competent 
authority that more than half the teachers in Germany, 
especially those in the secondary schools, such as the Gymna- 
sien, Real, higher mercantile, etc., are disciples of Herbart. 

In Austria, Hungary, the Balkan States, Armenia, his 
followers are to be found, and attempts are being made to 
introduce his works into Italy and France by means of trans- 
lations. Ufer mentions especially Edouard Roehrich's Theorie 
de VEducation aVapr&s les Principcs de Herbart} as a good 
work. In Holland De Raaf has translated Dorpfeld's book 
Tiber Denizen und Gedachtniss, besides writing a popular 
introduction to Herbart's Psychology. In the United States, 
where Prof, de Garmo is his most enthusiastic advocate, he is 
widely known. Prof, de Garmo has founded a Herbart society 
in Saratoga, besides having translated several works of the 
Herbartian school, such as Lange On Apperception, and pub- 



1 Paris, 1884: Delegrave. 



4 Introduction to Herbart's Science and Practice of Education 

lished various treatises and articles. The educational press in 
the States has been favourable to the Herbartian movement, 
and some of the reviews closely follow its development in 
Germany. This work has steadily progressed owing to the 
continued efforts of the Herbartian school, represented by such 
men as Ziller (now dead), Dorpfeld, Rein, Lange, Drubal, 
Lindner, Wolkmann, Ballauf, Kern, Willman, Pickel, Scheller, 
and others, whose works, elucidating, developing, and practically 
applying Herbart's ideas, are studied by a large number of 
German teachers. Their efforts have been mainly devoted on 
the one hand, to working out into a complete system Herbart's 
science of education on its theoretical side, and on the other 
to developing it into a practical method or art. Herbart 
originally applied his system to secondary education only ; his 
followers' strenuous work has been to remould all education, 
elementary and secondary, according to that system. In doing 
this they have undoubtedly gone beyond Herbart in some of 
their developments, and it would be an interesting study to 
trace out, by comparison with Herbart's original principles, how 
far they have remained true to them. We shall attempt to do 
this later on in regard to the dual theory of the historical cu 1 ' 
grades and concentration centres. The great initial diffir 
lay in the want of suitable manuals, but this has been r 
overcome by the publication of a number of practical wor^ 
especially during the last sixteen years, handbooks for teach- 
ing, chiefly in elementary schools, various subjects on strictly 
Herbartian principles. 1 

Ufer attributes much of the rapid spread of Herbart's in- 
fluence to the publication of these practical works. Although, 
as we have seen, Herbart's principles have exerted a powerful 
influence on German education, it must not be supposed that 
his system as such, has been adopted to any great extent in 

1 Eberhardt: Poetry in the Elementary Schools (Langensalza : Beyer); 
Staude : Preparations for Histories of the Old and New Testaments 
(Dresden : Bleyl) ; Thrandorf : Religious Instruction in the Higher Classes 
of Elementary Schools (Dresden : Bleyl) ; Staude and Goppert : Prepara- 
tions for German History (Dresden : Bleyl) ; Fritzsche : German History 
in the Peopled Schools (Modern) (Altenburg : Pierer) ; Matzat : Method of 
Geographical Instruction (Berlin: Parey). 



Introduction 



either the secondary or elementary schools in Germany. These 
being for the most part communal, municipal, and state 
schools, a considerable unanimity of opinion is required before 
changes can be made in their curricula and methods of teach- 
ing. Though Herbart's wide spread influence on teachers must 
necessarily permeate the schools, and some of his principles are 
carried out in certain branches of instruction, his system has 
by no means found such unanimous acceptance as to make more 
direct and radical changes possible. Perhaps one chief reason 
for this is, that all elementary schools in Germany, except the 
purely technical ones, are denominational — either Lutheran or 
Catholic — and the position which religious instruction occupies 
in Herbart's system can only with difficulty be accommodated 
to such conditions. The building up of a firmly established 
self-contained moral character through the operation of the 
enlightened will was, as the reader will perceive for himself, 
the goal of all Herbart's educational efforts. Prom the begin- 
ning of his career to its close, this was kept clearly in view, 
and it determined the whole course of his educational thought, 
work, and investigations. Knowledge, while always subor- 
dinate to this main aim, and indeed only valuable in so far 
it furthers it, was an indispensable condition to its attain- 
ts for with Herbart ignorance and morality could not exist 
-her. " Stupid people," he says, " cannot be virtuous " 
\Stumpfsinnige konnen niclit tugendhaft sein 1 ). The school 
then was to do its part by training the disposition and storing 
the mind with knowledge. It was to supply its share of the 
material which must be present for the will to act upon, and 
in the active manipulation of which that will, with such aid 
as the teacher could give, must gradually work out its own 
enlightenment. This work in the school was to be carried on 
in a religious atmosphere and warmed by religious feeling. 
But the direct teaching of religion as such, at least in early 
years, was to be left to the Church, and still more to the home. 
Even there, to judge from Herbart's words hereafter quoted, 3 
it was principally to take forms other than those of dogmas or 

1 Umriss pcldagogischer Vorlemngen, p. 64. 2 Ibid., p. 92. 



6 Introduction to Herbart's Science and Practice of Education 

confessions of faith, forms compatible with his theory of 
morality — a theory based on the mind's intuitive judgments, 1 
and not on religion in the common acceptation of that term. 
The more modern Herbartian school, on the contrary, instead 
of making the formation of a moral character the great end 
of education, has set up in its place the formation of a sound 
Lutheran Christian, and makes formal religious instruction the 
starting-point from which all other instruction, even of the 
natural sciences, proceeds. It uses, as we shall hereafter 
describe, the religious material for the " concentration centres " 
and " historical culture grades," as the backbone of the whole 
system of instruction. It is open to grave doubt whether such 
a use is a true outcome of Herbart's principles, whether it is 
not rather the result of an effort on the part of his followers 
to limit the principles which Herbart held to be of universal 
application by local conditions of thought and faith. 

Education being, in Herbart's words, " a vast whole of ceaseless 
labour, which exacts true proportion from beginning to end," 
obviously needs a plan or system. To influence the soul 2 aright, 
a knowledge of its laws is absolutely needful ; hence the 
teacher requires to be acquainted with the science of psychology. 



1 Intuitive judgments form the basis of Herbart's system of ethics- 
They are to him an ultimate fact of consciousness, independent of the will, 
standing, as it were, opposite to it, and estimating the value of its acts. 
The essence of these judgments is the perception, present says Herbart, in 
every human soul, that to it individually, right and wrong are inconvert- 
ible terms; and their universal expression is consciousness pronouncing 
to itself the distinction for it between right and wrong. The standard 
by which the intuitive judgments estimate the will's acts changes with 
the changing states of human thought ; but the judge (the intuitive 
judgment), which, whatever the standard may be, pronounces to the 
individual whether he and his fellow-creatures attain in their separate 
acts of will to the standard or fall short of it, is a constant power in 
every human soul. Since the intuitive judgments are involuntary and 
absolute, springing up whenever the question of moral worth or worth- 
lessness has to be determined, and are utterly without proof, since none 
is possible, they are analogous in nature with the judgments which we 
pass without any logical evidence on musical harmonies and dis cords 
on hearing them. On the strength of this analogy, bast d on the in- 
voluntary origin and certainty without proof, between the judgments 
of will and those "of art, Herbart extends the term aesthetic judgments 
to the intuitive judgments as well as to those passed on art proper. 

2 For Herbart's use of the term soul, see p. 18. 



Introduction 



It is the handmaid of pedagogy. Herbart says of it, " Psychology 
is the primary auxiliary science of the teacher; we must have 
it before we can say of a single lesson what has been taught 
rightly and what wrongly." 

But this large and complicated task has an aim, viz., to build 
up a moral character. The teacher has to lead the child to the 
knowledge of good and evil, to train his will to choose the good, 
and to enable him of himself to keep thereto and continue to 
make it the law of his life. For active perception of this aim 
in general, as well as in individual parts, a knowledge of 
ethics or practical philosophy 1 is needful, and it is thus the 
second assistant science of pedagogy. 

Herbart was the first to base pedagogy, the science of educa- 
tion, directly on ethics and psychology, and this is his great work 
for, and service to mankind. From ethics he derived the end and 
aim of all teaching : virtue ; from psychology, the means where- 
by it is compassed. He is the founder of modern educational 
psychology ; he made the implicit psychology latent in the best 
of teaching before his time explicit. As mathematics are the 
basis of astronomy, so is psychology the only trustworthy 
basis for any true science of educatiou, and only by the appli- 
cation of that science to the art of education can any cer- 
titude be obtained as to its methods and results. Education 
has hitherto been, and even now is, one of the most uncertain 
and unsatisfactory of all arts, for it is one in which the 
practical worker is least certain of his results. Herbart's ideal 
was a science of education which, translated into practice, 
must compass its aim. That aim, again — virtue — if the possi- 
bility of its universal attainment were to be proved, also needed 
a firm and universal foundation, and this Herbart" found in the 
intuitive judgments of the mind. 2 In the mind then he 
sought and found solid rock, the certitude for both his aim and 
his means. 

We have thus three main divisions of our subject : (1) 

1 Practical philosophy is the doctrine of what ought to be as dis- 
tinguished from general philosophy, or the doctrine of what "is." 
Whenever practical philosophy is mentioned, morality, or the science of 
it — ethics— is intended. 2 See note, p. 6. 



8 Introduction to Her barfs Science and Practice of Education 

pedagogy, or the science of education ; (2) ethics, whence we 
derive its aim ; (3) psychology, whence we derive its means. 
Herbart, as a practical teacher, began with pedagogy; this led 
him to study psychology, and later on ethics in relation to 
formation of character. Then all three combined, and developed 
in his mind for the remainder of his life, each forming and 
being formed by the others. His psychological and ethical 
studies were always carried on and utilized with a view to the 
work he had set himself to accomplish, viz., the establishment of 
education on a scientific foundation. The results of his ex- 
perience and labours were given to the public from time to time 
in many volumes, of which the Science of Education was one 
of the earlier, and was written before his Psychology. This 
inversion of scientific sequence is one of the main causes of the 
difficulty many readers have found in understanding the Science 
of Education. 

The student therefore who begins the study of it expecting 
to find it a compact and complete science of psychology will 
be disappointed. Scattered throughout the book are numerous 
pregnant psychological statements, and, it must be confessed, 
side by side with them many dark sayings, the terminology 
of which alone must leave the reader who is ignorant of 
Herbart's later psychological works in doubt as to their mean- 
ing. The cause of this has already been indicated. The Science, 
of Education was the outcome of Herbart's practical work as a 
teacher, while the greater part of its theoretical groundwork 
lay in his mind unformulated at the time it was written. The 
formulation of the pyschological basis of the theory of educa- 
tion was, as he says in the introduction to the Science of Educa- 
tion^ at that time only " a pious wish." It is true that he begau 
his study of psychology during his teacher years in Berne with 
an attempt to calculate and express the working of elementary 
psychologic laws in terms of mathematics. But Herbart's own 
words, as well as the internal evidence of the Science of 
Education, prove that no system of psychology was formu- 
lated by him till long after its appearance in 1806. In a letter 
of 1831 to his friend Schmidt on " The Application of Psychology 
to Education," he writes, " The Science of Education is in- 



Introduction 



complete, for although, as the title says, it is deduced from the 
aim of education, the psychology, which I was at that time 
only beginning to search for, is deficient." Again, in his an- 
nouncement of the Outlines of Educational Lectures in 1835 
he writes, " The psychology of the author was worked out and 
written down during many years of educational activity, and 
rose in great part out of the experiences acquired thereby." 

Something of the same difficulty, though arising from a 
different cause, will be felt by the reader in understanding the 
ethical element in the Science of Education. Many of the 
terms found there — for instance, the idea of benevolence, the 
idea of perfection, the objective and subjective sides of cha- 
racter — are used by Herbart in a sense peculiarly his own, and 
they therefore only receive their explanation and significance 
when the connotation he gives them is fully understood. 

But notwithstanding the obscurity of the psychology and 
ethics found in the Science of Education, there is a vital 
bond, as the student will discover for himself, between them 
and Herbart's scheme of education. " Through the teacher's 
aim, education is connected with practical philosophy ; in the 
consideration of ways and means and obstacles thereto, it is 
connected with psychology." l Therefore the understanding of 
those sciences so far as they form the basis of his Science of 
Education is obviously indispensable to its comprehension and 
use. 

The reader, who, it is presumed, is still unfamiliar with the 
translation before referred to of the Allgemeine Padagogik 
{Science of Education) and the Introduction thereto contained 
in the same volume, will, it is suggested, find it advantageous 
at this point to turn to the general summary of Herbart's 
philosophy and principles of education given therein from pp. 
24 to 56. By reading it, he will obtain a general outline of 
the whole subject, the details of which are to be filled in by 
degrees through later study. This summary could have been in- 
troduced at this point, but as it can be found there, and space is 
limited, it is unnecessary to repeat it here. In all that follows 



Briefe HerbarVs. 



io Introduction to Herbarfs Science and Practice of Education 

therefore it is presumed that the reader has made himself 
acquainted with it. He is therefore recommended to take his 
course of Herbart as follows : — 

1. The sketch of Herbart's life and educational work and 
also the summary of his philosophy and principles of education 
contained between pp. 1 and 56 in the Science of Education, 
then — 

2. The present work as a preparation to — 

3. The general principles of the Science of Education from 
p. 78 to the end, and — 

4. The aesthetic revelation of the world as found from pp. 
57 to 77, containing Herbart's ideal aim for education. 

In the succeeding pages, we shall, while following the three 
main divisions of the subject before named, attempt to give 
first a sketch of Herbart's educational pyschology, then an 
outline of his ethical theory and aim, and lastly of his practical 
pedagogy, as the application of his psychology to the art of 
teaching. Connected with this some references to developments 
of the modern Herbartian school will be necessary ; they are 
interesting especially in regard to the dual theory of the con- 
centration centres and the historical culture grades, which has 
latterly given rise to much warm debate in educational circles 
in Germany. 



CHAPTER I 

PSYCHOLOGY 

The possibility The possibility of education rests for Herbart 
of education. a £ rst p r ] nc ipl e of his psychology, i.e., the capacity 
of the human will for cultivation. 1 This capacity is revealed 
during the process of cultivation by the transition of the will 
from a state of impetuosity and capriciousness to a state of 
stability. The power of education is, however, not unlimited. 
It is conditioned by the individuality and environment of the 
child. 

The need for The necessity for education Herbart finds in his 
education. con viction, that the child's mind is in its very na- 
ture undetermined either for good or ill when it comes into 
the world. The mind, unlike the body of the child and the 
varied forms of the animal and vegetable world, does not move 
during its life on earth to an end predetermined in the germ. 
For it is built up entirely of presentations 2 which, received 

1 Umriss pddagogischer Vorlesungen. 

2 By a presentation Herbart means not only the combination of 
various sensations by the mind, which we call a percept, but the single 
sense impressions of which a percept is composed. These impressions 
supply the mind with its primordial presentations — those of sight, 
touch, taste, etc. — from which all the after-contents of the mind are 
derived. The primordial presentations constitute, however, but a small 
part of the mind's contents ; their interaction produces the derived 
presentations, which in their varied developments form the greater 
part thereof. Presentations once created, the recurrence of the sensu- 
ous impression, which necessarily entered into the process, is un- 
necessary ; they are an abiding portion of the mind's contents, playing 
their part, now one of re-presentation in consciousness, without further 
aid from the special sense organs. Those among them which are the 
distinct and absolute reflection of the thing or idea which caused them 
are capable of development by the processes of comparison, abstraction, 
generalization, into concepts (indirect sensuous presentations) which 
form the material for the higher and highest processes of thought. 
For the union of two concepts in a proposition involves an act of 
judgment, and the inference or conclusion, the induction or deduction 



12 Introduction to Herb arts Science and Practice of Education 

primarily through the senses, subsequently in their combin- 
ations, changes, and interactions, constitute all the manifold 
forms of consciousness. A plant develops to a predetermined 
form ; an animal must fulfil the work of its nature : its in- 
stincts compel it to a consequent activity. From the human 
being, possessed of intelligence instead of instinct, no such 
consequent course of action can be inferred. " He, who may 
become a wild animal or personified reason, who is unceas- 
ingly moulded by circumstances — he needs the art which can 
so build that he may receive the right form." * It is folly to 
expect this, as Rousseau did, from nature, and still greater folly 
to await it from chance. 

The importance The importance of education follows immediately 
of education. f r0m Herbart's proof of its necessity. If the mind 
is built up of presentations, and is inherently neither good nor 
bad, but develops one way or other under external influence 
and the guidance of the teacher, it follows that what it receives 
in the form of presentations and their mode of combination — 
that is to say, the work of education — is of infinite importance. 

Education The justification for education Herbart finds in 

justified. tte f act tliat the chjia begins life without a will 
of his own, and so cannot enter into moral relations with him- 
self and the world around him. To the wild impetuosity which 
he at first possesses, and which is a principle of disorder, im- 
pelling him hither and thither, the term ivill cannot be applied. 2 
The motve for The natural and noblest motive for education 

education. Herbart finds in the love for children. 3 
The work of The work cf education is to form the circle of 

education, thought by means of government, an educating 
instruction, and discipline ; to build up the store of that which 
passes by degrees from interest to desire, and thence through 
action to the formation of the will. It is a " vast whole of 
ceaseless labour, which exacts true proportion from beginning 
to end." 

we draw from snch judgments involves an act of reasoning [Science 
of Education, p. 33). 

1 Stand p unlet der Beurtheihtng der Pestalozisehen Methode. 

2 Science of Education, Book I., chap. 1. 3 Ibid.. Book I., chap. 2. 



Ps) cJw 'ogy 1 3 



me aim of edu- Finally, the aim of education is to form such a 

cation. circle of thought that from it a good will — that is, 

a will obedient to right insight (Einsicht) 1 — may arise. 

_ ^ ., Education assumes a soul in the child upon which 

Herbart's use . . . , 

of the term it can work. Before examining the grounds 01 the 

"soul." . 

assumption that the child ftas a soul, the meaning 
Herbart attaches to the term must be explained. 

Psychologists like Bain and Sally use " mind " to signify the 
sum of the states of knowing, feeling, and willing, experi- 
enced by an individual. They say nothing of an immaterial 
substance in which the states of knowing, feeling, and willing 
arise. Ward, for example, views psychical phenomena as re- 
lated to a formal subject or ego ; Herbart, on the contrary, 
views them as related to a metaphysical substance. To this 
non-material substance, of which he always takes account, he 
gives the name soul. The primary activity of the soul is 
presentation, and this primary activity he calls geist, a term 
sometimes translated mind, sometimes intellect. Feeling, 
desire, volition, are states arising from the interaction of the 
presentations. These states Herbart calls gemilth, i.e., the 
disposition, or, as he himself terms it, " the heart." " So far as 
it presents or conceives, the soul is called intellect (geist) ; 
so far as it feels and desires, it is called disposition or heart 
(gemilth). The disposition has its source in the mind ; in 
other words, feeling and desiring are conditions, and for the 
most part changeable conditions, of the presentations." 2 

Herbart conceived of the soul as a simple, unchanging being, 
originally without any plurality of states, activities, or powers ; 
on its union with the body it becomes the bearer of the pre- 
sentations, which, as hereafter explained, mutually conflict 
with and suppress or fuse with each other in consciousness. 
Herbart believed the psychical activity of this distinct spiritual 

1 Eight insight, as Herbart uses the term, is the resultant of two 
conditions : (1) that the circle of thought shall contain a store of truth — 
i.e., a correspondence between the order of its ideas and the order of 
phenomena ; (2) that the individual possessing such a circle of thought 
shall actively use it in the effort to discern and assimilate (apperceive) 
new moral and intellectual truth. Right insight thus covers what 
is ethically good and intellectually true. 2 Lehrbuch zur Psychologic 



14 Introduction to Herbarfs Science a id Practice of Education 

substance to be, like the physical energy of the material world, 
indestructible. On this ground he held the soul to be immortal. 
11 He considered the argument from design to be as valid for 
Divine activity as for human, and to justify the belief in a 
supersensible reality, concerning which, however, exact know- 
ledge is neither attainable nor on practical grounds desirable." 1 

The meaning attached by Herbart to " soul " precludes the 
substitution of any other term for it here. 2 But the student 
is reminded that, as the basis of his psychology, it includes as 
its modes of manifestation, like the term mind before referred 
to when used by psychologists, knowing, feeling, and willing. 
It is permissible to use the terms mind and soul as inter- 
changeable so long as the classification of their manifestations 
is under consideration. A step farther back, however, when 
the relation of these manifestations to each other is the subject 
of inquiry, the radical distinction between the terms comes 
forth, and will become clear to the student when he has 
mastered Herbart's theories of feeling, desire, and will. 
The mdepend- What is our ground for assuming the child has 
of n tiie e S?i en in- a son l ? What are our reasons for rejecting the 

dicated. materialistic assertion that everything which we 
call spiritual is but a state of the corporeal ? 

Look at a piece of sugar. The rays of light emerging from 
it penetrate successively the several parts of the eye until they 
strike the retina. The process, to this point physical (optical), 
now becomes physiological. The extremities of the optic nerve 
situated in the retina take up the stimulus transferring it to 
the optic nerve itself and thence to the brain. The vibration 
of a certain brain fibre is, according to materialism, synonymous 
with the consciousness of the stimulus. 

If I place the sugar on my tongue, and afterwards take it in 
my hand, other sets of nerves — i.e., those of taste and touch 
— successively carry the stimulus by the same process to the 
brain, setting in vibration in each case, however, a different 
set of brain fibres. 



1 Article on Herbart, Encyclopaedia Bri f annica. 
* This opinion is confirmed by Prof. Sully. 



Psychology 1 5 



Now, wh>-~n we think of a piece of sugar, it occurs to us that 
it is white, and sweet, and heavy. Hence we see that the 
impression did not merely set certain brain fibres in motion, 
but that something beyond this — i.e., a combination — has taken 
place. This combination is only conceivable on the assumption 
of an existence other than the body, an existence Herbart calls 
soul. Beyond the physical and physiological processes there 
is the ps}^chological, and materialism, treating the mental only 
as a function of the material, can in no way explain this 
combination of impressions. We find it in a simple percept 
when we apprehend an external object by combining various 
sensations, in sugar, for example, those of sight, taste, and 
touch ; we find it in the re-presentation of the percept when 
we combine the impressions of the sensations, the sugar 
being no longer present ; and we find it in every higher stage 
of mental activity. It was this power, the power of memory, 
which caused Kant to characterize consciousness as a synthesis, 
interconnection But in differentiating soul from body we must 
° f souf and not l° se s ight °f a f a °t °f experience of great 
importance to the teacher, i.e., that each reacts 
on the other. Modern investigation tends to prove that " for 
every phenomenon in the world of consciousness there is a 
corresponding phenomenon in the world of matter, and con- 
versely (so far as there is reason to suppose that conscious 
life is correlated with material phenomena)." As Prof. 
Hoffding has shown, " the parallels between the activity of con- 
sciousness and the functions of the nervous system point to 
such a relation, and it would be an amazing accident if, while 
the characteristic marks repeated themselves in this way, 
there were not at the foundation an inner connection." 1 What 
the nature of the connection is we cannot tell. Its practical 
expression for the teacher is that the health or disease of each 
is a cause of the health or disease of the other. 

Turning now to the exclusive consideration of 
The teacher ° 

has to do with mental phenomena, we see how much more varied 

tity plus its and extensive are the contents of an adult's mind 
endowments. than thoge Qf ft j^ child * Sj and the Httle cbild > s 

1 Outlines of Psychology, Prof. Hoffiing, chap, ii., pp. 50-64. 



1 6 Introduction to Herbarfs Science and Practice of Educat'o i 

again than those of an infant. We may presume the new-born 
child has no mind contents of any importance. Herbart's be- 
lief, founded partly on metaphysics and partly on his own 
observations, was that the soul has originally no contents, but 
begins to acquire them as soon as it enters into union with the 
body. Since the soul has in itself (in its essence 1 ) no con- 
tents, the term endowment cannot be applied to it as such. 
The souls of all human beings are alike in substance. When 
Herbart and his school speak of the soul's lack of endowments, 
we must remember they refer to a state anterior to its union 
with the body. Now the teacher has to do solely with the 
union of body and soul, and he finds, at the stage when he 
comes in contact with it, certain endowments already present. 
Firstly, it has what we may call inborn endow- 

endowments. nients — the result of the bodily nature. No two 
human bodies exist which are identical in all their 
parts. Given this cause alone, the essential life of every 
human being must be something peculiar to itself, for the body 
influences the soul. In other words, the mind, through the 
medium of the nervous system, enters into reciprocal relations 
with the external world, and the more perfect that sj'stem the 
richer may be the store of sensuous impressions, and hence of 
mind contents. 2 

Acquired Secondly, there are acquired endowments arising 

endowments. f rom the environment which birth assigns to every 
human being, and which are necessarily peculiar to each. The 
factors of which this environment is composed are twofold, 
locality and human society, and each of them has its share of 



1 All that exists exists in se or in alio, either in itself or through 
something else. Colour, weight, smell, exist only in something other 
than themselves, i.e., in substantials to whose nature they belong. The 
stuff on which they act exists in itself, in se. The latter is called sub- 
stance (reality, essence) ; the former are called adherents (accidents). The 
relation between subsiance and accidents, which in popular parlance is 
expressed by the word Jiave, is termed inherence. The soul, then, is a 
substance ; its contents are adherents. 

2 Herbart expresses this thus: — "The mind, according to the physical 
form in which it is embodied, finds in its functions sundry difficulties, 
and conversely relative facilities" (Science of Education, p. 113;. 



Psychology 1 7 



influence on the child. " The inborn is an heirloom ; the habits 
acquired in earliest years are a dowry." * 

Herbart estimates the great influence of environment in 
determining the nature of the acquired endowments, and thus 
in preparing the ground for the teacher, as follows : — " In the 
case of those who as children are subjected to the guidance 
of various persons, and shuffled about among different houses 
and conditions of life, we usually find masses of presentations 
which are inconsistent with each other, and are badly con- 
nected. It is difficult to obtain their perfect confidence, for 
they nourish secret wishes and feel contrasts which are diffi- 
cult to discover, and some follow tendencies which education 
cannot countenance. Far more capable of culture are those 
who have always been trained for a long time by one person 
(the mother being the best), and have not been accustomed to 
conceal their inner life from that person. Then the great thing 
is to join the further education on to that already existent, and 
to demand no leaps of thought from the child." 2 
Factors condi- We may infer from the preceding that two pupils, 
teacher's power, taught and treated in precisely the same manner 
by the teacher, would develop into identical human beings if — 

1. Their bodies were absolutely alike. 

2. If their acquired endowments were the same. 

3. If the hidden and uncontrollable influences which affect 
education, and are beyond the teacher's knowledge and control, 
were precisely the same in kind and degree. 

These factors, however, never are identical, and even where 

environment appears to be absolutely the same the children in 

its midst will develop differently. The power of the teacher is 

therefore conditioned by the sum of the child's inborn and 

acquired endowments, in other words, roughly speaking, by his 

individuality. 3 

All education, according to Herbart, takes place 
The senses are ' f ' x 

the medium for through the medium 01 the body. ±he sense 

organs are the doors through which entrance to 



2 



Letters on the Application of Psychology to Pedagogy, No. 4. 

I'mriss padagogischer Vor/esungen, 33. 

Science of Education, Ti aiislatur'ss Introduction, p. 34. 



1 8 Introduction to Herbarts Science and Practice of Education 

the mental life is obtained, and the mind contains nothing 
which has not initially entered it through them. Hence, the 
more perfect the senses, the richer may be the contents of the 
mind, though it does not necessarily follow they must be so. 

That a human being has good sense organs is not sufficient 
The objects upon which to exercise them must also be present. 
" You remember," says Carlyle, " that fancy of Plato's of a 
man who had grown to maturity in some dark distance, and 
was brought on a sudden into the upper air to see the sun rise. 
With the free, open sight of a child, yet with the ripe faculty 
of a man, his whole heart would be kindled by the sight." 
Again, the boy in Jean Paul's Levana appreciates the beauty 
of the world, when he first sees it after a childhood spent in 
a subterranean chamber. Both he and Plato's child-man are 
indeed creatures of the imagination. A child, who had not 
been allowed to receive a number of sense impressions, would 
be neither capable of instruction, nor of perceiving the ex- 
ternal world aright, much less of appreciating its beauty. 
Rousseau is truer to fact than either Carlyle or Richter. His 
Emile has a correct visual impression of the sun because his 
eye has been accustomed to its light Its rising arouses his 
curiosity, the legitimate, because natural, feeling at his age ; 
but he cannot appreciate its beauty, " because the complex and 
momentary impression of all these sensations requires an 
experience he has never gained." l Compare with these in- 
stances the recorded experiences of Caspar Hauser. Set free 
after having spent his youth in a dark room, he was shown the 
beautiful view from the tower of Nuremberg, and he drew 
back in fear. When questioned later as to his behaviour, he 
said, " On looking out of the window it seemed to me as if just 
before my eyes, there were a shutter on which a painter 
had splashed a hotch-potch of colours — white, red, yellow, 
green, blue. Single things, as I now see them, I could not then 
distinguish. I was obliged to convince myself later during my 
walks, that what I had seen were fields, mountains, and 
houses." The senses then need cultivation and exercise. Like 



1 Rousseau's I/mile, Miss Worthington's translation, p. 125. 



Psychology 19 



a lock gate, they must be opened, that the external world may- 
stream into the mind. They must be made sensitive like a 
photographic plate, that the manifold objects of the external 
world may be imprinted in pictures, clear, sharp, and enduring, 
upon the mind. As sight is " the leading avenue " of perception, 
the term which Pestalozzi used, and which means literally 
sight perception, may be extended to all perceptions or " obser- 
vations " made through the other senses. This term is An- 
schauung, the act of observing the qualities of an object and 
then combining them in the mind. 

If we examine our mental life, we find that some- 
feeimg,and' thing appears to take place in us without any 
wmmg. expenditure of power on our part : this is presen- 
tation. Again, something else appears to take place with us, 
so that we are pleasurably or painfully affected by it ; this is 
feeling. And yet again, something else appears to go out of 
us as our own doing, and to this the general term willing or 
acting is applied. 

In the older systems of psychology, as elsewhere ex- 
plained, 1 intellect, feeling, and will were considered to be dis- 
tinct capacities or faculties of the soul. Herbart, on the 
contrary, considered these three activities to be simply modes 
of one element common to all. He founded his proof on ex- 
perience, metaphysics, and mathematics. We can here only 
explain his theory of mental life in so far as it rests on ex- 
perience. 

First, in regard to presentation, he held that we 
acquire all presentations primarily through the me- 
dium of the senses in the following manner. If I handle a 
piece of sugar, then look at it, and finally place it in my 
mouth, I receive impressions of heaviness, of whiteness, and 
of sweetness. These impressions, singly called sensations, are 
the primordial presentations, and are comprehended in the mind 
as the " image " or " idea " of sugar. This idea, created from 
single sense impressions, we call an observation. 2 It is the 

1 Introduction to Science of Education, p. 32. 

2 The term AmcJiauung, used here by Herbart, is translated in 
this book, as throughout the Science of Education, by the word observa- 



20 Introduction to Herbarfs Science and Practice of Education 

complex of collective impressions which we have of a thing. 
11 Observations," whether acquired through the different senses, 
or through one sense, are formed not by a simple, but by a 
complex, act. Sensations of sight, touch, and taste, are ele- 
ments in the observation of an orange. An observation of a 
rose at a distance where only one sense — that of sight — is em- 
ployed, also involves numerous sense impressions (of red, green, 
round, etc.). In both cases the mind is active in combining 
the sense impressions, and it is the sum of them which gives 
the " observation " of an orange or of a rose. 
The origin of Touch and sight each supply us with a number 
through the °^ sense impressions of one object — its form, den- 
senses. s ity, size. Hearing, taste, and smell each give us 
respectively but one sense impression. Therefore touch and 
sight are the most important senses in acquiring " observa- 
tions," because the knowledge we obtain through them of 
objects is more extended than that given by the other senses. 

Each sense is affected by different stimuli — the sight, for 
instance, by the rays of light which we perceive in various 
degrees of light and shades of colour. In a white ball, the ray 
of light emitted by the point in the upper surface nearest to 
me is the lightest ; the more remote parts emit darker rays. 

Hon, but it must be carefully noted, this, though in some respects the 
best rend ring, is by no means an equivalent for Anschauung. Mr. 
Quick writes of attempted renderings thus (Educational Reformers, 
p. 3G1) : " ' Sense impression ' has lately been tried for Anschauung ; but 
this is in two ways defective, for (1) there may be Anschauungen be- 
yond the range of the senses, and (2) there is in an Anschauung an 
active as well as a passive element, and this the word 'impression' 
does not convey. The active partis brought out better by 'o serva- 
tion,' the word used, by Joseph Payne and Jam s Mac Mister, but this 
seems hardly wide enough. Other writers of English borrow words 
straight from the French, and talk abmt 'intuition' and 'intuitive,' 
words which were taken (first, I believe, by Kant) from the Latin 
intuere, ' to look at with attention and reflection.'' " " Intuition," in this its 
strictly etymological sense, is the term Mr. Quick chooses, but there is 
a misleading popular use of it, which seems to make avoidance of it, if 
possible, desirable. The term " observation," here chosen, is a fairly 
satisfactory equivalent for Anschauung, if Mr. Sully's definition of 
observation as " regulated perception " be kept in mind — that is, ''per- 
ception, into which a special degree of mental activity is thrown, so 
that what is present may be carefully and accurately noted' 
(Teacher's Psychology, Prof. Sully, p. 144). 



Psychology 2 1 



The importance of the sense of touch now becomes apparent. 
The rays of light will give me no knowledge of the shape of 
the body, unless my sense of touch has been previously active 
about it. Movement of the tactile organ in a gradually chang- 
ing direction must have given me the idea of roundness. 
Then I perceive a certain arrangement of light and shade 
goes with the form, which active touch has proved to me to 
be spherical. Finally, after these experiences of touch and 
sight have become associated, and I know that an object of 
spherical form is accompanied by this particular condition 
of the rays of light, I conclude on seeing it that the ball in 
question, at least on the side turned towards me, is rounded. 
So when I attribute a spherical form to a body in looking at 
it, I infer the form from the nature of the rays of light, but 
do not perceive it immediately. " We translate visual im- 
pressions into terms of the earlier and more elementary ex- 
periences of active touch. Seeing is thus to a large extent 
a representative process and an interpretative act of the 
mind. First because the knowledge of geometric properties 
is fuller and more direct in the case of touch than in that 
of sight, and second because with respect to the important 
mechanical properties — hardness, weight, etc. — our knowledge 
is altogether derived from touch, tactile apprehension is to be 
regarded as the primary and most fundamental form of 
perception." 1 

In the sense of touch, we must distinguish between touch 
proper — the consciousness of contact — and general skin sen- 
sibility. The most highly sensitive parts of the tactile organ 
are the tongue, finger-tips, and lips. Democritus, 2,300 years 
ago, recognized the importance of tactual sense as the basis of 
all the senses, and its influence upon the^ development of in- 
telligence is proved by Herbert Spencer. The parrot has the 
greatest tactual power, and is the most intelligent of birds, for 
it acquires knowledge impossible to birds which cannot use their 
feet as hands ; the elephant is the most intelligent of quad- 
rupeds, the basis of its sagacity being the number of ex- 

1 Teachers Psychology Prof. Sally, pp. 135, 137. 



22 Introduction to Herbarfs Science and Practice of Education 

periences it owes to its wonderfully adaptable trunk; the 
more intelligent apes, again, have increasing tactual range and 
delicacy. The tactual sense is, as it were, the mother-tongue 
of all the senses, into which it must be translated to be of ser- 
vice to the organism. 1 

Definition of That which remains of a sense impression in 
presentation, the soul after the physical stimulus which creates 
it has ceased, is called by Herbart a presentation (Vorstel- 
lung). 

Herbart distinguishes as an Empfindung that which 
exists of a sense impression in the soul while the physical 
stimulus is still going on (a percept). But since he divides 
all manifestations of soul into primary activities and secondary 
states, and Empfindungen are primary activities, arising from 
the union of body and soul, which cannot be analyzed further, 
they fall under the general term Vorstellung. They are the 
elementary material, the primordial presentations in which all 
subsequent psychical growth is generated. 

The most elementary form of presentation, that 
presentations. ^ rom which Herbart considers the whole after-con- 
tents of the mind are built up, " is not an object 
with many properties, something in time or space, but simple 
qualities such as red, blue, sour, sweet, and not even a general 
concept of these, but just such a presentation as would arise 
out of a momentary comprehension of each quality through 
the senses." 2 If such elementary presentations are combined 
(as white, sweet, heavy, in sugar), a derived or compound 
presentation or " observation " 3 (Anschauung) is the result. 
The "observation," however, is invariably the presentation of 
a single thing: this oak, this beech. We have a particular 
presentation of each tree in our garden, but there is also a 
presentation valid for all (a concept). Such a presentation 
is general, abstract, while an " observation " is particular. 

1 Taken from Prof. Tyndall's Belfast address. Any adequate 
account of the remaining sense organs would occupy too much spacfe 
here; the reader can refer for it to many excellent English worksi 
Prof. Sally's Human Mind, Prof. Hoffding's Psychology, etc. 

2 Lehrbach zur Psychologie Observation, p. 10, J. F. Herbart. 

3 See note 2 on Ansa hunting, p 19. 



Psychology 2 3 



We may therefore divide presentations into two classes, i.e. 
concrete and abstract, and the concrete again into two species, 
i.e. simple and compound. 

Presentations form the contents of the soul. The 
the contents of term contents, as here used by Herbart, does not 

the sou. signify the entrance of something taken from the 
external world into the soul. As a consequence of the phy- 
sical stimulus, a certain condition arises in the soul. The 
soul then is the bearer of the presentations which combine 

identical ^ n ^* -^> ^ or Stance, I see a tulip to-day and 
presentations, another to-morrow exactly like it, I have not two 
presentations of the tulip, but a single one, which is much 
clearer after the second view than after the first. Hence the 
law, Identical presentations coalesce to form a single clear 
presentation. 

Analogous -^ u * a ^ presentations are not identical. Many 
presentations. are only analogous ; that is to say, they com- 
bine both identical and disparate elements. When I 
look at a square table and a rectangular table, all that 
is identical in the presentations combines and comes out 
clearly (four feet, plane surface). The disparate elements 
(square, rectangular forms) also struggle towards clearness ; 
but they, unlike the identical, war against and, as it were, 
mutually suppress each other, while the identical mount to 
unchecked clearness. Hence the law of analogous presenta- 
tions, The identical elements promote, the disparate check, 
each other. 

In the identical we forget the disparate, or at least, if 
the disparate are to come out clearly, a certain degree 
of effort is needed. In other words, while we retain the 
class qualities of things, the accidents^ are apt to fall 
away, i.e. be forgotten. Mr. Galton, in his attempt to 
take a composite photograph of twelve criminals, found that by 
exposing the plate to each face one-twelfth of the time required 
for taking an ordinary photograph, he obtained one in which 
the characteristics common to all appeared, while the individual 
peculiarities were quite indistinct. Such a composite photo- 
graph does the mind take of presentations containing identi- 



24 Introduction to Herbart'' s Science and Practice of Education 

cal and disparate elements. Hence the law, Analogous pre- 
sentations blend with one another. This blending takes place 
most readily when the presentations are made almost contem- 
poraneously. 

Disparate -But tn © re are a l so presentations which are 

presentations, entirely disparate, for instance heavy, white, 
sweet. Here no blending can take place, for none of the 
elements are identical. But if they enter consciousness at 
the same time, they form a group the elements of which 
belong together, as in sugar. In visiting a salt mine. I see 
the miners, the excavations, etc., hear the rumbling of the 
trucks, smell the salt in the atmosphere and the close air -of 
the mine, taste the water impregnated with salt in the lakes, 
and touch my neighbour's shoulder to guide me in the descent. 
These presentations 'together form what Herbart called the 
complication of a salt mine. 

Rise and fan of -^ ^ ^ 00 ^ a ^ a pl an t attentively, I think of 
presentations, nothing else ; but if I am disturbed, the presenta- 
tion of the plant disappears, making room for the presentation 
of the sound or sight, etc., which disturbed me. The first 
presentation is suppressed, checked ; in Herbart's words, 
arrest has taken place : it has sunk down. Thereby he 
merely signifies that its clearness has gradually diminished, 
until at length I am no longer conscious of it. If the cause 
of disturbance be removed, I easily recollect the first pre- 
sentation without looking at the plant. It grows clearer, 
again fills the whole of consciousness, and now the presenta- 
tion made by the disturbing cause — sound, sight, etc. — has 
sunk. Herbart says that a presentation sinks when it is 
suppressed by another ; it disappears for a time from con- 
sciousness, though not out of the mind itself, and rises again 
as opportunity offers. These two processes of rising and sink- 
ing constitute what Herbart calls the movement of presenta- 
tions. 1 Accurately speaking, only a single presentation occupies 
the foreground of consciousness at any one time. The others, 
which have disappeared from it, are, as Herbart expresses it, 

1 Science of Education, p. 126. 



Psychology 2 5 



below the threshold of consciousness, or are in the condition 
of sinking or rising. Hence we conceive of the limits of 
consciousness. The moment " when a presentation becomes a 
re-presentation — that is, when it rises out of a condition of 
complete suppression " — it is said by Herbart to be " on the 
threshold of consciousness." 

The presentations are never all at rest ; some 
equilibrium of are in a state of flux. In Herbart's words, " the 
consciousness. m - n( j j s a i wavs [ n motion." Nevertheless, as 
he expresses it, the circle of thought is said to be at rest, in 
equilibrium, when no abnormal acceleration of the course of 
the presentations takes place, that is when there is a sufficiency 
of force among them to hold them equally in a condition of 
arrest. 

The example given above shows that if a pre- 
Laws of the . , . , , . , P . ., 

reproduction sentation has disappeared irom consciousness, it 

presentations. can nevertheless return, be reproduced. This pro- 
cess of reproduction is governed by definite laws, 
first formulated by Aristotle. 

Law of ^ ne mos t important of these laws is that of Con- 

Contiguity. tiguity, which may be thus expressed. Presenta- 
tions which occur together or in immediate succession tend 
to cohere, so that the future appearance of any one of them 
tends to recall or suggest the others. Croesus, King of Lydia, 
being condemned to be burned to death by his conqueror Cyrus, 
called aloud the name of Solon. The reverse of fortune he was 
then enduring recalled to him the time long before, when he, 
then in the height of his prosperity, was told by Solon he 
could not call him happy until his death, for great prosperity 
in this life was often followed by great misfortune. The en- 
durance of this misfortune recalled the thought of him who 
had spoken of its possibility. 
The law of The second law is the law of Similarity. It 
similarity. ma y ^ Q ^us ex p resse( j t A presentation tends to 
recall a past presentation or presentations when some of the 
elements in both are analogous. The greater the number of 
these analogous elements, and consequently the greater the 
similarity of the presentations, the stronger will be the force of 



26 Introduction to Herbarfs Science and Practice of Education 

the recall. Certain traits in the face of Duncan while he slept, 
recalled so vividly to Lady Macbeth the image of her father, 
that her intention to murder Duncan was arrested. 

" Had lie not resembled 
My father as he slept, I had doneV * 

The law of The third law is the law of Contrast, which may 
contrast, ^q thus expressed : A presentation tends to recall 
a past presentation or presentations when almost all the elements 
in both are opposites. Columbus, in his old age, was unjustly 
cast into prison by his ungrateful sovereigns (Ferdinand and 
Isabella). On his release he hung his fetters in his room as 
symbols of the ingratitude of princes. Looking at them, he 
was reminded by contrast of the rich gifts he had before re- 
ceived for his services and of the former gratitude of his 
sovereigns. The law of contrast is, according to certain 
psychologists, of less importance than the other two, since 
calling up ideas by contrast is rather the result of a habit 
of thought acquired by the discrimination involved in per- 
ception, than an original tendency. 2 

Herbart, in his Lehrbuch zur Psychologies gives no classi- 
fication of the laws of association. He writes, "Psychological 
works are full of observations, which are not necessary here, 
about the association of presentations, the manner in which 
they recall one another, not merely by connections once per- 
ceived in space and time, but also by similarities, and appa- 
rently by contrasts." 3 This order of enumeration seems to 

1 Macbeth, Act II. , Scene 2. 

2 '• Kant was in express opposition to associationism, and to the extent 
that his influence prevailed, all such inquiries as the English associa- 
tionists went on to prosecute were discounted in Germany. Notwith- 
standing, under the very shadow of his authority, a corresponding, if 
not related, movement was initiated by Herbart. Peculiar and widely 
different from anything conceived of by the associationists as Herbarfs 
metaphysical opinions were, he was at one with them, and at variance 
Ivith Kant in assigning fundamental importance to the psychological 
investigation of the development of consciousness, nor was his concep- 
tion of the laws determining the interaction and flow of mental pre- 
sentations and re- presentations, when taken in its bare psychological 
import, essentially different from theirs" (" Association of Ideas," En- 
cyclopedia Britannica, by Prof. Croom Robertson). 

8 Lehrbuch zur 1'sycho'ogie, Obs. 92. 



Psychology 2 7 



indicate that he considered the law of contiguity," connections 
once perceived in space and time," the most important. The 
context may indicate, he held with earlier English psychologists, 
that the other two laws of similarity and contrast are reducible 
to the fundamental law of contiguity; but, at any rate, it is 
clear he held them to be of minor importance. 1 

presentations " We ma y almost sa y>" writes Herbart, " there 
indestructible. are n0 such things as destroyed presentations." 2 
They are retained in the mind, merely becoming latent through 
the subduing power of other presentations. Thus, for example, 
" in travelling, where novelties of all kinds press in upon us, 
mental food is often supplied so rapidly from without that there 
is no time for digestion. We regret that the quickly shifting 
impressions can leave no permanent imprint. In reality, how- 
ever, it is with this as with reading. How often we regret 
not being able to retain in the memory one-thousandth part of 
what is read. It is comforting in both cases to know that the 
seen as well as the read has made a mental impression." 3 
immediate The presentations are, as it were, elastic springs, 
reproduction wn ich can be pressed down, but fly back to their 
presentations, original position as soon as the pressure is removed. 
When a presentation rises by virtue of its own force above the 
threshold of consciousness, what is called an ivnmediate repro- 
duction takes place. Herbart defines it as " that reproduction 
which by its own force follows upon the yielding of the hin- 
drances. The ordinary case is that a presentation gained by a 
new act of perception presses back everything present in con- 

1 The classification used here is in accordance with Herbart, but not 
■with Ufer, who gives a fourfold division in the following order: (1) law 
of similarity, (2) of contrast, (3) of co existence^ (4) of sequence, thus 
subdividing the law of contiguity into co-existence and sequence. Prof. 
Hoffding gives a threefold division as follows : (1) association of ideas 
by similarity ; (2) association of ideas by the relation between the parts 
and the whole ; (3) association of ideas by external connection (con- 
tiguity). He assigns the first place to the law of similarity on the 
ground that every association by contiguity presupposes an association 
of similarity, and he eventually reduces the three laws to one : the law 
of totality (Psychology, by Prof. Hoffding, chap, v., "The Psychology 
of Cosrnition "). Prof. Sullv gives the classification we have used here. 

2 Lehrbuch zur Psychologie, Obs. 11. 

8 Life of Schopenhauer. Helen Zimmern, p. 122. 



28 Introduction to Herbarfs Science and Practice of Education 

sciousness opposed to the old presentation, which is similar to 
the new one. Then, without further difficulty, the old concept 
rises of itself." * A curious testimony to the mind's power of 
immediately reproducing, not only presentations in the form in 
which they have been acquired, but also after they have been 
unconsciously elaborated in the brain, was given by Prof. Hehn- 
holtz : " As I have often been in the uncomfortable state of 
being compelled to wait for ' happy thoughts,' I have gained 
some experience of how and when they came to me. Some- 
times it was suddenly and without effort, like an inspiration. 
So far as my experience goes, they never come to the tired brain, 
nor at the desk. I was always obliged to turn my problem 
about on all sides, so that I could follow all its turns and 
windings in my head without writing. This involved long pre- 
paratory work. Then, after the fatigue caused thereby was 
over, I had to take an hour of bodily refreshment, and then the 
' happy thoughts ' came. Often when I woke up in the morn- 
ing they were there." 2 

Immediate reproduction is of two kinds. In the first case, 
the thoughts with which we have been occupied, after dis- 
appearing, return of themselves, as on awaking from sleep or 
on returning to business after an interruption, when the pre- 
sentations of the objects with which we have been occupied, 
having been suppressed for a time by some disturbing element, 
come back of themselves. In the second case, to take an ex- 
ample, a presentation A is suppressed by another, B ; and a 
third, C, which will not fuse with B, enters from without. B 
and C contend with and check each other; the suppressed 
presentation A takes advantage of this, and again rises above 
the threshold of consciousness. Let, for instance, A signify the 
tone of a voice, B the seeing of a plant, C the hearing of a 
similar voice. B and C contend, check each other, and the 
older presentation of the voice rises into consciousness. The 
suppressed presentation regains its place through the mutual 
opposition of the others. 



1 L<>lrbuch zur Psycliofogie, chap, in., p. 26. 

8 Speech by Prof. Heloxlioltz on hjs seventieth birthday. 



Psychology 29 



Mediate The opposite process to immediate, Herbart calls 
reproduction me( ^[ a ^ e reproduction. It takes place when a p re- 
presentations. sen tation brings back with it into consciousness 
another with which it was previously united. The former pre- 
sentation is called an "assistant." Presentations which thus 
call up each other are said to be linked, associated. The associa- 
tions which are formed of fused presentations are the most 
enduring. Of the " complications " before explained, where 
only an artificial connection exists, an element may easily be 
forgotten. 

The power of reproduction varies in different 

PclSSlVG 

and active individuals and in the same individuals at different 
repro uc ion. ^ meg The reproduction of presentations may be 
either passive, when the mind yields itself to the flow of its 
thoughts, or active, when by a voluntary use of the laws of 
association we recall past presentations. A humorous example 
of passive reproduction is Mr. Brooke's speech to the electors 
of Middlemarch. " Mr. Brooke having lost other clues, fell back 
on himself and his qualifications, always an appropriate, grace- 
ful subject for a candidate. ' I am a close neighbour of yours, 
my good friends ; you've known me on the bench a good while ; 
I've always gone a good deal into public questions— machinery 
now, and machine-breaking : you're many of you concerned 
with machinery, and I've been going into that lately. It won't 
do, you know, breaking machines ; everything must go on : 
trade, manufactures, commerce, interchange of staples — that 
kind of thing — since Adam Smith — that must go on. We must 
look all over the globe — "observation with extensive view" — 
must look everywhere, " from China to Peru," as somebody says, 
Johnson, I think — " the Rambler" you know. That is w r hat 
I have done up to a certain point — not as^ far as Peru, but I've 
not always stayed at home. I saw it wouldn't do. I've been 
in the Levant, where some of your Middlemarch goods go, and 
then again in the Baltic. The Baltic, now ! ' " * 

The active process before mentioned into which the will 
enters, may be called recollection (sich besinnen). Schopen- 

1 Middlemarch , George Eliot, chap. li. 



30 Introduction to HcrbarCs Science and Practice of Education 

hauer describes this voluntary use of the laws of thought by 
himself : " If I faintly perceive an idea which looks like a 
dim picture before me, I am possessed with an ineffable longing 
to grasp it ; I leave everything else and follow my idea through 
all its tortuous windings, as the huntsman follows the stag ; I 
attack it from all sides, and hem it in until I seize it, make it 
clear, and having fully mastered it, embalm it on paper. Those 
ideas which I capture after many fruitless chases are generally 
the best." 1 The following is a concrete illustration of the 
voluntary use of the laws of association : " You ask me the 
name of the statesman who tried so hard to set poor Louis 
XVI.'s finances in order, and I cannot remember it. Not re- 
membering the initial of the name, I let my mind dwell for 
a moment on Lous XVI. As I do so the names of Calonne, of 
La Fayette, even of Burke and Pitt, occur to me. These are 
not what I want, and I refuse to let my mind dwell on them. 
I think of Madame de Stael — stop ! she was the daughter of the 
statesman whose name I seek. Of Gibbon: that reminds me 
that he had sought the same lady in marriage. Then Geneva, 
and Lausanne, and Ferney, and Voltaire, all names which are 
connected, come rapidly through my mind, and in the midst of 
them Necker's name is suggested, and I fasten on it at once. 
It is what I wanted." The voluntary effort here consists, 
as Mr. Fitch points out, in fixing the attention on the hopeful 
suggestions as they emerge, and withdrawing it from the 
rest. 2 
Definition of Herbart defines memory as the power of the mind 
memory. u ^ re t a in and reproduce presentations in the same 
form and order in which they were first received." 3 He dis- 
Memory is of tinguishes three kinds of memory, each correspond- 
tnree kinds. ^ ^fa t ^ e na ture of the material upon which it 
exercises itself. 

Rational We can learn and remember materials between 

memory. w ] 30Se elements there is a fundamental connection, 

by fixing our attention when learning on this connection. For 

1 Life of Schopenhauer, H«'l^n Zimmern, p. 49. 2 Lectures on Teaching % 
Mr. Fitch, p. 127. 3 Lehrbuch zur Faycliologie, 29. 



Psychology 3 1 



instance, the chief points of any well-known historical epoch 
easily recur to our minds, because of the relation of cause and 
effect between them. Take the rise of the Dutch republic. 
The cruel intolerance of Philip of Spain led to the formation 
of the famous band of patriots called Les Gueicx. Their pro- 
test against the establishment of the Inquisition in Holland 
being disregarded, the Dutch revolted, and under William of 
Orange fought against the Spaniards until the siege and 
relief of Leyden practically ensured their independence, etc. 
We learn thus intelligently (judicios, from judicium = judg- 
ment). The first kind of memory, then, is the judicious, or 
rational. 

ingenious But Herbart saw there was much material of 
memory, knowledge between whose elements there is no 
essential connection, and in learning which some other aid must 
be adopted. I wish, for instance, to remember the treble 
spaces in music, and in connection with them I think of the 
word FACE, which immediately recurs with the thought of 
them, and suggests them to me in their order. Here there 
is no necessary, but merely an arbitrary, combination. This 
method of learning is called by Herbart artificial or ingenious, 
because through ingenuity connections are sought out between 
essentially different things. The second kind of memory, then, 
is the ingenious. 
Mechanical But again, Herbart points out, there is material 
memory. w ] 1 i c ] 1 can b e learned neither judiciously nor in- 
geniously, but only by continued repetition ; for instance, the 
list of prepositions. By frequent repetition, the series is so I 
completely fused together that the first word suggests the 
second, and so on, till the whole passes through our conscious- 
ness mechanically, that is without any ^effort of attention or 
intelligence. The third kind of memory is the mechanical. 
Essentials of a ^ n tne school each class of memory is utilized, 
good memory. ^ good memory must possess many qualities. 
What is learned must be learned easily — the mind must be 
acquisitive ; it must be retained — the mind must be retentive ; 
it must be retained unaltered — the mind must be exact ; what 
the mind contains must be easily reproduced at any moment— 



3 2 hitroduction to Herbarfs Science and Practice of Education 

it must be ready ; and, lastly, it must be well stored. These 
qualities are seldom, if ever, combined. A high degree of 
acquisitiveness seems to exclude a high degree of retentive- 
ness, for when a rapid fusing of presentations takes place, the 
process is not likely to be so perfect as when it proceeds more 
slowly. There is not time for the complete links of association 
to be formed, and cramming instead of learning is the result. 
A good memory is built up by bringing new presentations into 
fundamental union with the old ; the new then are not merely 
an addition to the old, but interpenetrate them. If this is not 
done, the material is worthless. It is not governed by the laws 
of association, and speedily disappears from consciousness, 
because it has no points of attachment. Thus the first kind of 
memory is the most valuable. In learning we should carefully 
avoid the intrusion of foreign presentations between those to 
be learned, since the connection of the latter would be checked 
thereby. The high degree of self-control necessary to this is 
only gained by long-continued practice. 

suppressed A presentation which has become so obscured 
presentations, .^at it has been long below the level of conscious- 
ness, is said to be forgotten. But this is only a relative term, 
for when once a presentation has entered the mind it may 
reappear at any time ; we can never know it has gone. Volun- 
tary forgetfulness is almost an impossibility ; hence the Greeks 
ascribed supernatural power to their mythical stream Lethe. 
An instance of the way in which an idea that has once passed 
through the mind, may be reproduced at however long an 
interval by suggestion, is given by Dr. Abercrombie : " A lady 
in the last stage of chronic disease was carried from London to 
a lodging in the country; there her infant daughter was taken 
to visit her, and after a short interview carried back to town. 
The lady died a few days after, and the daughter grew up 
without any recollection of her mother till she was of mature 
age. At this time she happened to be taken into the room in 
which her mother died without knowing it to have been so. 
She started on entering it, and when a friend who was with 
her asked the cause of her agitation, replied, ' I have a 
distinct impression of having been in this room before, and 



Psychology 33 



that a lady who lay in that corner and seemed very ill, leaned 
over Hie and wept.' " 1 

Abstract The transition from concrete to abstract presen- 
presentations. ta ti Q ns is made by numerous perceptions and 
revivals of percepts of similar things. A child who has seen 
only one table with a four-cornered surface has but an in- 
dividual presentation, and can have no idea of any other table. 
If he sees one with a rounded surface, the presentation he 
already has is extended ; it applies at least to two different 
shapes of furniture. Every new presentation of a different 
table widens his presentation of table as such ; the latter is, 
however, no longer the presentation of a single object, but an 
abstraction applying to all the tables perceived, which, however, 
cannot itself be seen. The child has unconsciously dropped 
many unessential qualities (four-cornered, round, etc.), and has 
retained those which are identical. The result is not a 
pictorial re-presentation of a table, but a general or abstract 
re-presentation of those qualities which are common to a 
number of tables. This re-presentation may be further re- 
modelled by later observations (of flower-tables, work-tables, 
etc.), when qualities before considered essential may be 
discarded. The earlier re-presentation then is imperfect in 
so far as it is not the result of observation of all kinds of 
tables, and also because the involuntary perception of the 
single table does not estimate with sufficient accuracy what is 
common to all the objects, and what not. 

A re-presentation of this nature is sometimes 
logical con- called by Herbart a psychical concept , and sometimes 
cepts ' a common image (Gemcinbild). The term recept, 
used by English psychologists, exactly corresponds to Herbart's 
psychical concept, and marks off this class of re-presentations 
from the perfect concept. " It is an image formed out of a 
number of slightly dissimilar percepts corresponding to 
different members of a narrow concrete class." It contains 
both the essential and unessential qualities of a thing. To 
separate them — that is, to find the logical concept — we must 



Intellectual Powers, 5th Ed. p. 120. 



34 Introduction to Herbarfs Science and Practice of Education 

first (to continue our example), know all kinds of tables, 
and, second, the qualities which are not general must be de- 
signedly separated. For instance, the important points of a 
table to us in practical life — its size, its form, number of feet, 
stability, material, etc. — all these are no part of the essence of 
a table, but this essence, that which belongs necessarily to 
every table, is— (a) that it has a horizontal surface; (b) that 
this is sufficiently supported on legs, or their equivalents ; (c) 
that the purpose of the whole is for something to be done or 
laid on it. These three properties constitute the essence of 
table. 

„ . , It is obvious that to determine the concept of a 

Logical and . « . . . 

psychical con- thing correctly is not easy, yet if the definition is 

'false or incomplete, and is nevertheless considered 
correct and as such made further use of, the contents of the 
whole structure of thought raised upon it will be false. Con- 
cepts of material objects are more easily formed than those of 
psychical objects, because the qualities of the latter are not 
capable of appealing to the senses. Concepts are merely some- 
thing thought, not something existent in matter. Certain oaks, 
firs, etc., exist, but not that which is a tree and nothing be- 
yond. The logical concept remains unchanged ; the psychical 
fluctuates The latter differs in different individuals ; the 
former is the same in all. Farther, the concepts which are 
formed designedly remain psychical, unless every object neces- 
sary to the formation of logical concepts be forthcoming. By 
far the greater number of our concepts are psychical. 

Presentations, if they are to fulfil the reason for 
The importance ' J 

of forming an which they are acquired — i.e.. to be turned to 

interconnected _ h 

circle of account — must reappear readjly in consciousness. 
The teacher must be careful that they combine 
with each other, so that the circle of thought may be easily 
traversed from any point desired. Without this, even under 
favourable circumstances, groups of presentations will be 
formed which have no connection with each other. Then, 
since each group excludes the rest, the action and volition of 
the individual, growing as they do out of the presentations, are 
determined by the contents of the group which happens to fill 



Psychology 35 



consciousness. Certain phases of thought and action present 
themselves which last until the contents of the group are 
exhausted; then another, which may directly contradict the 
preceding one, takes its place. The character of Louis XI. of 
France illustrates this. When the one side of his character — 
his devotion to his own interests, combined with absence of 
any sense of moral obligation — was uppermost, its active ex- 
pression was a succession of cruelties, perjuries, and suspicions ; 
but the other side — his gross superstition and fear of death — 
when uppermost, prompted him to acts which modified or 
directly contradicted the former. Thus the murder of Graleotti 
the astrologer, planned by Louis, was promptly averted by the 
latter upon the sage's acute prediction, that the King's death 
would follow his own at an interval of twenty-four hours. 1 

Since, according to Herbart, character depends on stability 
of will, which will is formed by the circle of thought, it is 
obvious that a human being with isolated groups of presenta- 
tions, will have what is called a weak character — one in which 
desires and will are continually changing. Hence the great 
fact, which Herbart insists must always determine and regulate 
the teacher's activity, that " those only wield the full power of 
education who know how to cultivate in the youthful soul a 
large circle of though''" cCosely connected in all its parts, 
possessing the power of overcoming what is unfavourable in 
the environment and of dissolving and absorbing into itself 
all that is favourable." 2 

Analogous Presentations which approach an already accu- 
presentations. mu ] ate( j s t re will stand either in identical, or 
analogous, or disparate relationship to its individual parts. 
Identical presentations, since, as we have seen, 3 they only make 
those already received clearer, add nothing intrinsically new 
to the existent store. Disparate presentations only admit of 
the arbitrary connection existent in a " complication." 4 There- 
fore we can only properly apply the term apperception, or 
assimilation, to analogous presentations. 



1 Quentin Durward, Sir Walter Scott, chap. xii. 

2 Science of Education, p. 92. 3 P. 23. 4 P. 24. 



36 Introduction to Her barfs Science and Practice of Education 



Apperception re-forms both old and new presen- 
' tations or groups of presentations. Sometimes the 
re-formation of the new depends on the character of the old. 
For instance, the old presentations supplied by Copernicus tell 
us the earth is a sphere revolving round the sun. Sight (or 
rather an incorrect inference from sight 1 ) provides us with a 
new presentation, i.e., that the earth is a plane round which 
the son revolves. Nevertheless we do not believe our sight, 
and the new presentation it provides us with is re-formed by 
the old. In Prescott's Conquest of Mexico we are told that the 
Indians, who had never seen a horse until Cortes landed there, 
11 believed the horse and his rider to be one and the same." 
This presentation was re-formed when, after a man and horse 
being killed, they found them to be separate entities. In this 
case, contrary to the last, the old was re-formed by the new pre- 
sentation. 

The process of Apperception may be defined as that interaction 
apperception f tivo analogous presentations or groups of pre- 
sentations, ivhereby the one is more or less re- 
formed by the other, and ultimately fused with it. 2 Every 
presentation (perception) is formed more or less under the 
co-operating and determining influence of apperception ; that is 
to say, under the influence of the elements acquired by the 
mind's previous activity. Often, however, this is not sufficient 
for the complete mastery of the new ; the links which connect 

1 "One of trie most celebrated examples of a universal error prod vie d 
by mistaking an inference for the direct evidence of the senses was the 
resistance made on the ground of common-sensa to the Copsrnican 
system. People fancied they saw the sun rise and set, and the stars 
revolve in circles round the pole. We now know that they saw no such 
thins; ; what they really saw was a set of appearances equally recon- 
cilable with the theory they held and with a totally different one " 
(Fallacies of Observation Logic, J. S. Mill). The student must bear in 
mind that the knowledge that the earth revolves round the sun and 
the incorrect inference that the sun revolves round the earth are both, 
according to Herbart, groups of presentations, although derived ones. 
See note, p. 11. 

2 "Apperception is that psychical activity by which individual 
perceptions, ideas, or idea complexions are brought into relation to 
our previous intellectual and emotional life, associated with it, and 
thus raised to greater clearness, activity, and significance " (Appercep- 
tion : a Monograph on Psychology and Pedagogy, Karl Lange). 



Psychology 37 



the new with the old in the act of perception are too few and 
too weak. But the connection ought to be as many-sided and 
as strong as possible, and therefore the perception mnst in 
many instances receive further thought, in consequence of 
which a renewed, more perfect, and stronger apperception takes 
place. To this end the teacher's or another's help is often 
necessary to call up in the child's mind presentations analo- 
gous to the new. "The teacher must explore the existing 
store of thoughts in the children." If all the old presenta- 
tions capable of entering into the act of apperception " stood 
like armed men in the strongholds of consciousness, ready to 
hurl themselves npon everything that appeared at the portals 
of the senses, overcoming and making it serviceable to them- 
selves," 1 such help would be unnecessary. But as this is not 
so, analogous presentations or masses of presentations often re- 
main stationary for a long time in consciousness, and only fuse 
when reproduced at the same time. 

If apperception is to be perfect, consciousness 
Attention . rr , . -, ,, . . , . 

necessary to must be concentrated on the new in its relation to 
appeiception. ^ e q ^ q ^ that which is to be apperceived or as- 
similated, so that everything foreign may be excluded, and 
only such presentations as are connected with the new be per- 
mitted, together with that new, to enter consciousness. An 
interconnected circle of thought does not exist in the little 
child or uninstructed man; therefore the power of concentration, 
and hence the process of apperception, is more or less imperfect 
and cannot take place unaided. For the apperceiving ideas, 
being disconnected, are necessarily isolated and weak. And 
these cannot rise when wanted into consciousness to meet and 
fuse with the new, nor can they suppress the ideas foreign to 
them and to those to be apperceived (the new), without the 
teacher's help. In short, the child and the uninstructed man 
cannot " concentrate their thoughts." In Herbart's words, 
" the thoughts have not learned to wait. On a given occasion all 
come forward (ie. both the apperceiving ideas and those foreign 
to them) ; so many of them become excited by the threads of 

1 Zur Lehre von den SinnestduscJtungen, Lazurus, p. 14. 



3$ Introduction to Herbart 1 s Science and Practice of Education 

association, and so many come suddenly into consciousness. 
The new (the ideas to be apperceived) are wondered at, but left 
unconsidered. There is no rejection of what does not belong 
to them." 1 Hence this concentration or disposition of the 
consciousness to promote a further growth of the presentations, 
which Herbart calls attention, " cannot at first be brought at 
all to run in an even stream." 2 He classifies attention as 
voluntary or involuntary, that is, according as the will does or 
does not enter into its creation. Involuntary attention he sub- 
divides into primitive and apperceptive. 

If I hear a shot when absorbed in work, my 
Involuntary . . . 

primitive thoughts vanish for the time, and I listen to it 

without willing to do so. If the children in a class 
are restless, and I hang a picture on the wall, they are quiet ; 
without any special resolve on their part, they attend to the 
picture. These are cases of involuntary primitive attention, 
which always depends on the strength of the sensuous im- 
pression. 

If a child in my room hears me reading aloud 
apperceptive from a scientific book, he pays no attention ; if I 

exchange it for a fairy tale, he does so directly. 
For the presentations the latter supplies are identical with, or 
related to, many already existing in his circle of thought. The 
attention no longer depends on the strength of a sensuous im- 
pression, but on the arousing of related presentations, which 
are the material for an apperception. For example, a cat lying 
on the hearthrug was observed to take no notice of a heavy 
fall of coals from the scuttle near her, but hearing faint sounds 
from the distant kitchen of a pestle and mortar, ran there at 
once. She had been in the habit when the meat was potted of 
receiving pieces of it. Here there was inattention to a strong 
sensuous impression (fall of coals) and attention to a weak one 
(pestle and mortar), because there was a relation between the 
physical stimulus and the psychical interest, i.e. in this case 
the presentations of eating. Where there is a relation of *his 
nature a secondary kind of involuntary attention is aroused, 
which Herbart calls involuntary apperceptive attention. 

1 Science of Education, p. 138. 2 Ibid., p. 139. 



Psychology 39 



Absolutely unknown material then excites no apperceptive 
attention, because it finds no points of contact in the mind; 
perfectly known material may excite, but cannot hold, atten- 
tion, because there is nothing new to apperceive. It is a 
happy mixture of the known and unknown which interests us 
the most. Involuntary apperceptive attention is one of the 
most important factors in education. With its assistance the 
new is assimilated without compulsion, and thus becomes an 
integral part of the circle of thought. 

Involuntary attention, however, is often in itself 

Voluntary . „ . J _ . 7 ,.-«-, , 

apperceptive insufficient, liven when children show some in- 
terest in a subject, the teacher must often encourage 
them to collect their thoughts, so that in a series of physical 
experiments, for instance, they may not only look at them 
superficially, but may discover what they are intended to 
demonstrate. The child thus clears the way, as it were, by an 
effort of his own will, and the presentations already existent in 
consciousness which are related to the subject in hand, answer- 
ing to this effort of will, stream forth to meet the new, 
strengthening and drawing it by their help into the centre of 
consciousness. This is voluntary attention. " It is chiefly 
necessary ," says Herbart, " when uninteresting matter is to be 
committed to memory." l Ordinary teachers, however, he 
points out, make a more extensive use of it. Thinking only of 
the moment's lessons, they take little account of the presenta- 
tions already existent in the pupil. Then when involuntary 
apperceptive attention, which they ought to have aroused by 
connecting the new with the old, fails, they try to excite volun- 
tary attention by encouragement, threats, and punishment. It 
is involuntary apperceptive attention, however, says Herbart, 
which the true teacher will seek chiefly to 'arouse, and to which 
lie will attach the greatest importance, for " the mere resolu- 
tion of the scholar to be attentive creates no clear comprehen- 
sion, and little co-ordination of what is learned ; that resolution 
wavers continually, and often enough wearies the child." 2 
Hence the necessity of connecting the new with the old, that 

1 Herbart, Umriss pcidagogischer Vorlesungen, p. 81. 2 Ibid., p. 79. 



40 Introduction to HerbarCs Science and Practice of Education 

is, of arousing and securing involuntary apperceptive attention 
at the beginning of every lesson. 

Herbart is unquestionably right in considering 
Importance of . _ ' • ."i . ■ . • 

voluntary involuntary apperceptive attention as a most im- 
portant element to the child's acquirement of know- 
ledge. In imparting that large amount of material which is at 
first necessarily uninteresting, but subsequently becomes in- 
teresting, the teacher, however, must arouse and greatly depend 
on voluntary attention. Its importance in this connection 
Herbart clearly saw, and while warning teachers that " that 
alone consumes mind and body which is pursued for a long 
time without interest," adds, " yet this does not take place so 
rapidly that we need fear having to conquer the first difficulties 
of what will soon arouse interest." 1 But another use of volun- 
tary attention he does not seem to have sufficiently estimated, 
i.e. its direct moral value in training the will to exercise self- 
control. Locke saw and emphasized its moral influence thus : 
" Though other things are ill learned when the mind is either 
indisposed or otherwise taken up, yet it is of great moment 
and worth our endeavours to teach the mind to get the mastery 
over itself, and to be able upon choice to take itself off from 
the hot pursuit of one thing and set itself upon another with 
facility and delight. This is to be done in children by trying 
them sometimes when they are by laziness unbent, or by avoca- 
tion bent another way, and endeavouring to make them buckle 
to the thing proposed." 2 German teachers also highly estimate 
its value in this aspect. " The child," says Bode, " if he would 
give this voluntary attention, must not allow himself to be 
disturbed by anything external, must concentrate his thoughts, 
and control their course. This is the road to self-control, the 
protection against that shallowness and desultoriness which 
destroys the moral life." 3 

Feeling, and Presentations, which, as we have seen, are pri- 
desire. mar y states of the soul, have their own secondary 
states, which Herbart classifies as feelings or desires. 



1 Science of Education, p. 257. 2 Thoughts on Education, Locke. 

8 Educational Problems in Elementary Schools, Bode. 



Psychology 41 



Origin of All action of presentations on each other is mani- 
feeiings. fested either as mutual arrest or suppression 
(that is, partial or complete obscuration 1 ), or as mutual 
combination (complication or blending), which is also mutual 
furtherance. Every feeling, whatever its nature, depends, ac- 
cording to Herbart, on this arrest or furtherance of the pre- 
sentations. 

But every arrest or furtherance of presentations does not 
necessarily generate feeling. If it were so, since new presenta- 
tions continuously enter the soul, consciousness would be always 
occupied and disturbed by feelings, and clear comprehension of 
objects, accurate thought, or reflective act would be impossible. 
Experience proves that we are practically unconscious of slight 
or momentary suppression or furtherance of presentations. The 
second hearing of a lately told tale, the recognition of a person 
we often meet, the forgetting of a name, all take place in us 
without any appreciable tension. 
Unpleasant Let us suppose the presentation (or mass of pre- 
feeimg. se ntations) A is reproduced by another presentation, 
a, and comes in contact during the process with a conflicting 
presentation, X Then A would be furthered in consciousness 
by a and checked by X, and this conflict would arouse an un- 
pleasant feeling. To take concrete examples, series or masses 
of presentations struggle with each other when we cannot re- 
member a name, a date, a quotation ; the minor presentation 
aids (for instance, the first letter of a name) are not sufficiently 
strong to overcome the arrest and produce clearness, and an 
unpleasant feeling is the result. The same result follows when 
we wish to banish something from our thoughts and are re- 
minded of it (perhaps by tactless questions or ill-timed con- 
dolence), or again when the clear current of our thought 
becomes confused, or the rapid flow of presentations is suddenly 
checked. 

Pleasant But possibly other furthering presentations a' a" a" 

feeimgs. ma y come to the aid of A, so that the conflicting 

presentation X is arrested or suppressed. Then the clearness 



1 P. 24. 



42 Introduction to Herba?-fs Science and Practice of Education 

of A increases ; and the victory over the conflicting X makes 
itself known as a pleasant feeling, modified by the expenditure 
of power. A feeling of pleasure arises then when the pressure 
on a presentation is removed — for instance, when, after long 
and vain thought, we remember a forgotten and necessary date 
or unexpectedly find a missing object, or when an event we 
dreaded does not take place, or when a piece of work at first 
unsuccessful, ultimately succeeds. 

Concrete ^ m °ther promises to take her child to a circus. 

example of Presentations obtained from a former visit are dwelt 

pleasurable 

and painful on for days before ; all other presentations are com- 
paratively suppressed. Just before starting, the 
child is naughty, and the mother says she will leave him be- 
hind. Immediately a violent conflict takes place in the child. 
The presentations already raised are too lively to sink imme- 
diately beneath the threshold of consciousness (be forgotten), 
while new ones absolutely irreconcilable with them (prohibi- 
tion) rush in simultaneously. They check the further rise of 
the earlier presentations, and the result of the checking is a 
painful feeling, which expresses itself in crying. Then the 
unwise mother relents, and the child is told he may go. The 
suppressed presentations again rush upwards, because the force 
which suppressed them is removed, and the child laughs even 
while his eyes are filled with tears. 

Herbart then defines a feeling as the becominq 
Herbart's _ . Z. , T a 

definition of conscious of a suppression or furtherance of the 

eing " presentations which are at the time in conscious- 
ness. Repression causes a feeling of pain, furtherance a feeling 
of pleasure. If pleasurable and painful feelings follow one 
another so rapidly that they cannot be distinguished from each 
other, mixed feelings or oscillations of feeling result. 

As we have seen, much of this suppression and furtherance 
is too weak to be differentiated as pleasurable or painful ; but 
since the furtherance, as a rule, outweighs the suppression, it 
causes only a feeling of vitality, which is really an obscure 
feeling of pleasure. This feeling of vitality is the threshold 
above which individual feelings must rise if they are to be 
distinguishable. 



Psychology 43 



Feelings must Feeling is thus, according to Herbart, no separate 
be formed capacity, but the effect of the interaction of pre- 

through tne . ' m1 . . . 

circle of sentations. The strength and vigour of the feelings 
' are in his psychology conditioned by the strength 
of the opposing or furthering presentations, that is by the 
extent of the arresting or furthering action of the presentations 
on each other. Hence follows an important principle in his 
system of education, i.e., that all working on the feelings must 
take place through the circle of thought. 

Feelings are of all degrees of intensity, from the 

Feelings of „ . . & „ ... • ,. ,., , 

pleasure and faintest tremor 01 like or dislike to the strongest 
pain ' feeling of pleasure or pain. Suppression of pre- 
sentations which have resisted the movement of our strongest 
series of presentations for a length of time arouses the most 
intense feeling of pleasure, while the successful and continued 
action of such opposing presentations creates the most intense 
feeling of pain. 

Herbart's dis- The distinction Herbart draws psychologically 

tinctionbe- . r J ° J 

tween sensa- between sensations (Empfindungen) and feelings 

tions and ~ _ 7 . . .... n • n • i • ry • /» 

feelings. (Gefulile) is utilized practically in his /Science of 
Education. Sensations (which are the primordial presenta- 
tions) are primary conditions of the soul dependent on the mere 
perception of organic stimulus (luhcther of the sensitive or sen- 
sorial nerves), and arise out of the interaction of body and soul. 
Feelings, on the contrary, are conditions which are not imme- 
diate products of nerve stimulus, but the result of acquired pre- 
sentations meeting together in consciousness. They are derived 
states of the soul itself, for they arise out of the interaction of 
presentations. Sensations minister immediately to intelligence; 
they are the material from which the psychical life is con- 
structed. Feelings, on the other hand, minister mediately to 
intelligence ; they are not merely building material for further 
mental construction, but form an important part of the already 
partially completed structure. Sensations have a very slight 
effect, feelings, on the contrary, a most important influence, 
on character and disposition. 

Herbart uses the term "sensation" in the following connec- 
tions. First, as made use of by unskilful teachers, "they 



44 Introduction to Herberts Science and Practice of Education 

use of term dominate the sensations " {Empfindungen) "of the 
the "Science off P U P^» an( ^' homing ^ Lim Dv ^ s bond, they unceas- 

Education." ingly disturb the youthful character to such an 
extent that it can never know itself." He warns such teachers 
against one of two results: either "character, which is inner 
stability, can never form under such circumstances, or it does 
so remote from the observation and disturbing power of the 
teacher, who will be astonished in after-years, when this secret 
growth expresses itself, at the difference between the aim and 
result of education." 1 Again, he apparently uses the term 
" sensation " to express a passing psychical state in the follow- 
ing passage : "We cannot expect much from that working on the 
sensations" {Empfindungen) " by which mothers especially so 
often believe they are educating their children. All sensations 
are but passing modifications of the existing presentations ;. 
and when the modifying cause ceases, the circle of thought 
must return by itself to its old equilibrium. The only result 
I should expect from mere stimulation of sensibility would be 
a fatal blunting of the finer sensations." 2 

Ambiguity in Because Herbart does not always clearly maintain 
the use of the ....... , , . ■•/■,. 

term "sensation." this distinction between sensation and feeling, pas- 
sages like the foregoing are somewhat ambiguous, and leave a 
doubt whether the stimulation he condemns is that connected 
with mere sensation, or that which works on the wider sphere of 
feeling. For example, though the feeling of pain with which 
we hear of the death of a dear friend is obviously essentially 
different from the sensation of pain which we experience from 
a burn or cut, Herbart includes under the head of "feelings 
(Gefuhle) which arise from the nature of that which is felt, such 
sensations {Empfindungen) of bodily pain as cutting, electric 
shock, toothache." 3 This, taken in connection with his prin- 
ciple that all working on the feelings must take place through 
the circle of thought, indicates that what he condemns in the 
its probable foregoing passages as transitory in effect, and there- 
connection 111 f° re useless as well as opposed to the formation of 
with teeimg. cnarac ter, is the stimulation of feelings directly 

1 Science of Education, Introduction, p. 85. 2 Ibid., p. 230. 
3 Lehrbuch zur Pxycliologie, par. 99. 



Psychology 45 



arising out of sensations (Empfindungen). That feelings can 
be produced by sensations, and vice versa, is obvious. A con- 
tinuance of wet, dull weather causes an unpleasant feeling of 
melancholy, and the reappearance of the sun an agreeable one 
of gaiety. Bodily pain produces the feeling of oppression and 
lassitude, its cessation one of relief. The perception of worms, 
slime, dirty matter, causes the unpleasant feeling of disgust. 
Such feelings depend for their degree of strength more or less 
upon the presence and duration of the sensation. True feelings, 
on the contrary, those which the teacher must form and to 
which he must appeal, because they arise from the interaction 
of presentations, the abiding states of the soul, " are strong and 
enduring, and grow into the deepest recesses in the foundation 
of human character." 1 This direct formation of feeling by the 
circle of thought in Herbart's psychology gives an additional 
importance to the work of instruction, and increased force to his 
words, " In the culture of the circle of thought the chief part of 
education lies." 2 

Feelings ciassi- Feelings, as the result of the interaction of presen- 
^nd. a quauta? * at ^ 0Ils ' ma y ^ e el ass ^ ne d as— (I.) those whose origin 
tive. depends on the form of the course the presentations 
take: these are called formal feelings; (II.) those whose cha- 
racter depends not on the course, but on the contents, of the 
presentations : these are called qualitative feelings. Under 
formal feelings are included expectation, hope, alarm, surprise, 
doubt, etc., under qualitative feelings those whose contents 
relate to truth, beauty, morality, and religion. 

Formal ^° ta ^ e ^ rsfc an example of formal feeling, i.e. ex- 

feeiing. pectation. I wish it may rain ; previous perceptions 
have formed in me the following sequence of presentations : (1) 
oppressive warmth ; (2) clouded heavens in the distance ; (3) 
approach of the storm ; (4) thunder and lightning ; (5) rain. If 
I now perceive (1) the oppressive warmth, I reproduce the 
whole sequence of presentations. Since the first perception is 
identical with the first reproduced presentation, both unite to 
form one. The same process is repeated if the following mem- 

1 Lehrbuch zur Psychologic, par. 104. 2 Science of Education, p. 214. 



46 Introduction to Her barfs Science and Practice of Education 

bers of the reproduced sequence are confirmed by perceptions of 
the natural phenomena. The consequence is that the power of 
the foremost members of the older presentation sequence in- 
creases, whereby its course is accelerated, and the pressure of 
its single members to unite themselves with the corresponding 
member in the new increases with every succeeding member. 
The reproduction, which up to this point received confirmation 
and considerable aid from the new, now outstrips it, and repre- 
sents to me the final member of the perception still to be made, 
that of rain (No. 5), which, it is assumed, will be identical with 
the reproduced final member (5), as, for instance, the first and 
second members of the perception (oppressive warmth and 
clouded heavens in the distance) were identical with the first 
and second members of the reproduced sequence. The sequence 
of presentations, however, runs out much more rapidly than the 
phenomena and the perception of them. In thought I have 
already reached the final member of the old sequence and of 
the new perceptions, while the perception itself is only being 
made, we will say, of the approach of the storm (No. 3), This 
throws me back to there produced presentation 3. In the in- 
terval, before the perception identical with the old member 4 
(thunder and lightning) is made, I have once more in thought 
reached the final member of the perception (the fall of rain), 
and nevertheless must go back to No. 4. I am at this point in 
the earliest stage of expectation, i.e., in suspense. 
Expectation. We may apply the example up to this point to 
explain Herbart's somewhat obscure description of the process, 1 
as follows : " Often the newly aroused presentation " (any of 
the reproduced presentations in the sequence which are not 
contemporaneous with the perception) u cannot come forth " (it 
is thrown back to an earlier presentation which is contempo- 
raneous with the perception). " This is always the case when 
interest started from the observation of an external reality" (op- 
pressive warmth), " and to this a fresh presentation attaches 
itself " (we will say the fall of rain), " as if the reality " (oppres- 
sive warmth) " moved in a certain manner " (in the sequence of 

1 Science of Education, Book II., chap. h\, 2. 



Psychology 47 



the five stages). " So long as the reality" (the oppressive warmth) 
''delays presenting this progress" (through the five stages) " to 
the senses " (that perceptions may be made), " interest hovers in 
expectation." 

Then follows release from suspense. If the last perception be 
identical with the last member of the reproduced sequence, 
there is no further hindrance. The presentation made by per- 
ception (of rain) unites with the reproduced presentation 5 ; 
the strengthened presentation rises unopposed, and I have the 
feeling of contentment. If, however, the clouds suddenly dis- 
perse before coming to rain, the presentation thus made, which 
is not to be repressed, conflicts with the contradictory one 
reproduced. The feeling of this repression is, according to 
Herbart, the feeling of disappointment. 
Qualitative (2) Qualitative feelings. — They are classified, 

feelings, according to the relation of their contents to truth, 
beauty, morality, or religion, as intellectual, aesthetic, moral, or 
religious. As an illustration of Herbart's theory applied to 
sympathy, a qualitative feeling belonging to the moral group, 
take the following. In the Tale of Two Cities, Darnay, the 
husband of Lucie, is brought before the revolutionary tribunal 
and condemned to death. Sidney Carton, who loved and still 
loves Lucie, ponders over Darnay's almost certain death and 
the grief Lucie will feel at the loss of her beloved husband. 
Thereby the group of ideas connected with his own loss of 
Lucie is vividly reproduced in Carton's consciousness, and with 
it the feeling of grief which accompanied that loss. At this 
stage his feeling of grief is identical w T ith, or at least similar to, 
that which Lucie would feel were her husband guillotined, for 
both spring from the same source — the loss of a beloved object 
— and he understands the grief Lucie ^would feel. He feels, 
through the reproduction of his own loss, the loss of another. 
He has the feeling of sympathy. But his sympathy does not 
stop at this point. It rises to its highest human expression — 
u Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his 
life for his friend." He takes by stratagem Darnay's place for 
Lucie's sake, the thought of whom so fills his consciousness 
that all dread of his own fate is suppressed, and he can feel on 



48 Introduction to Her barfs Science and Practice of Education 

his way to the scaffold, " It is a far, far better thing that I do 
than I have ever done; it is a far far better rest I go to, than 
I have ever known." x 

The essential condition of sympathy is thus a similarity be- 
tween the state of soul in one person and that in another or 
others. This state arises, according to Herbart, like all the 
feelings of this class, out of the internal action of a group of 
presentations having definite contents. He who has not to some 
extent the presentations which affect the sufferer cannot feel 
with him ; he has not the material for apperceiving the feelings 
of another. Ruskin expresses Herbart's theory that the way to 
sympathy is through apperception when he writes, "Human 
nature is kind and generous, but it is narrow and blind, and can 
only with difficulty conceive anything but what it immediately 
sees and feels. People would instantly care for others as well 
as for themselves, if qnly they could imagine others as well as 
themselves." 2 When once created through apperception, Her- 
bart shows that sympathy becomes in its turn a new and power- 
ful apperceiving centre — a truth exquisitely expressed by 
George Eliot thus : " Let us be thankful that our sorrow lives 
in us as an indestructible force, only changing its form as forces 
do, and passing from pain into sympathy, the one poor word 
which includes all our best insight and our best love." 3 

Desires, the remaining class of the secondary states 
of soul, depend, like feelings, on the interactions of 
presentations. The class " includes wishes, instincts, and every 
species of longing." 4 
Example of When Shylock the Jew, in Shakespeare's Mer~ 
desires. chant of Venice , is asked by Bassanio to lend the 
ducats to Antonio, the presentations which, form for Shylock 
the " complication " of Antonio are called up into his con- 
sciousness. They are, for instance — (1) Antonio's religion — 
" He is a Christian " ; (2) his habit, unlike ShyJock's, in lending 
money — " He lends outmoney gratis " ; (3) his hatred of Shy- 
lock's people — " He hates our sacred nation " ; (4) his disgust at 



1 Tale of Two Cities, Dickens. 2 Relation of Art to Morals, John Ruskin. 
3 Ada iu Bede, chap. 1. 4 Lehrhuch zur Fsychologie, 107. 



Psychology 49 



Shylock's actions — " he rails on me, my bargains, and my well- 
won thrift, which he calls interest." Another presentation — a 
pleasurable one — formed at the same time as these, and now 
by the law of co-existence called with them into consciousness, 
is that " of feeding fat the ancient grudge I bear him " 1 — the 
presentation of revenge. This is far more obscure than the 
other four, and it struggles to become clearer. Since it cannot 
become so completely until it is realized, the presentation is 
hindered in attaining complete clearness. The longer Shylock 
talks with Bassanio and Antonio, the more does this pleasurable 
presentation of revenge struggle against the hindering presenta- 
tions in his consciousness, i.e. those of Antonio's wealth, hi3 
reputation, the probability his argosies would return safely, etc. 
The pleasurable presentation "of feeding fat the ancient grudge 
I bear him " is in a condition of desire. 

Desire — the positive form of it — may be defined, 
Definition of . _ _ , r L . , . J . , _ ' 

desire and m Herbart's terms, as the becoming conscious oi the 

aversion. s t rU ogle f a presentation, or mass of presentations, 
against hindering presentations in consciousness. Aversion, 
the negative form of desire, may be defined as the becoming 
conscious of the hindrances a presentation or mass of presenta- 
tions offers to opposing presentations in consciousness. 
Distinctions Desire strives to attain to what is not yet present, 
sireJa e n e daver- avers ^ on *° remove (fend off, destroy) what is present 
sions. and makes itself felt. The object of desire is some- 
thing incomplete which needs completion, the object of aversion 
something forced upon the individual, against which the pre- 
sentations act with more or less success. In desire, says 
Herbart, the presentation of the desired object is the strongest 
and liveliest ; in aversion, the single presentation of the object of 
aversion is clearer than any one of the Opposing presentations. 
In both desire and aversion, presentations struggle against each 
other. The object of both is satisfaction, only the mode of 
attaining it differs. In desire, the object is something with 
which we would fill our consciousness. " Come hither," is the 
expression of that inner attraction, the beckoning hand the sim- 



1 Merchant of Venice, Act II., Scene 3. 



50 Introduction to Herbarfs Science and Practice of Education 

plest symbol of it. In aversion, the object: is something which 
we wish should form no element of our consciousness. " Away 
with it!" is the expression of that inner repulsion, and the 
averting hand its simplest symbol. 1 Desire is satisfied when 
the desired presentation reaches unchecked clearness ; aversion 
is satisfied when the detested presentation is suppressed, and 
with it the feeling of pain it created. With the increase of ex- 
perience, aversions are changed more and more into positive 
desires for those means which have proved themselves opposing 
forces to the aversions. 

tati n ^^ 8 °k«J ec t s °f desire are not external objects, but 
not external only presentations. Shylock longed to cut off the 
objects' of de-pound of flesh that his presentation of harming An- 
tonio might become perfectly clear. Hence the sub- 
ject proper of desire was not the pound of flesh, but the presen- 
tation of revenge ; the flesh was only longed for as a means to 
an end, the essential means for bringing about an internal state. 
To the objection that if only presentations are desired, it is 
incomprehensible why so many desires remain unsatisfied, 
Herbart would answer, that if objects were desired no desire 
could be satisfied, because no object as such can enter the soul. 
The paradox that we already have the presentation for which 
we long, is solved in that we have not the presentation as we 
desire it, for we have merely a re-presentation when we long for 
a sensation, an obscure presentation when we desire a clear 
one. 

Shylock, then, would have been satisfied when the rise of the 
presentation was aided by the cutting off of the pound of flesh, 
i.e. when the hindering presentations had been overcome. 
Desire, like feeling, has two stages : suspense and its relief. 
Suspense is greatest immediately before satisfaction ; the desire 
of the thirsty man for relief is greatest when he puts the cup 
to his mouth. 

Classification ^he classification of desires by the Herbartian 

of desires, school is based on the impulses which arouse them. 

These are either sensations and perceptions, or reproduced 



Empirische Psychologies Dr. Drbal, p. 276. 



Psychology 5 1 



presentations. Accordingly desires are either sensuous or intel- 
lectual. These classes, however, cannot be sharply defined. 
For a sensuous desire is often satisfied by reproduction (recollec- 
tion or imagined presentations), and, on the other hand, an in- 
tellectual desire is satisfied by a sensation. 1 
„ . _ Since desires depend, according to Herbart, on the 

Desire depend- m . in • 

entonthe interaction of presentations, desire for a thing 01 
presentations. . . , . , ,. . . -1 -t 

which we have no presentation is an impossibility. 

It may be urged, to take a simple instance, we desire to taste 
a dish unknown to us. But we only do so in so far as we 
assume it will raise certain presentations of taste we already 
have into complete clearness. 

Desire leading ^ n tnis wa y a ^ desire, depending as it does on the 
to will. richness of the presentations, grows, like feeling, 
directly out of the circle of thought. It is a most important 
agent in the formation of character, since, under certain con- 
ditions considered hereafter, it generates will. Herbart's esti- 
mation of its importance in relation to will caused him in his 
earlier writings to set up the awakening of many desires 2 as 
the immediate aim of instruction— an aim which he exchanges 
in his later work, The Science of Education, for the awakening 
of many-sided interest. The seeming contradiction between 
this early choice of the awakening of desire as the aim of in- 
struction and his later words, " It is inglorious to be absorbed 
by desires," is explained, when we remember he is in the second 
instance referring not to the whole region of desire, but to 
those sections of it which stop short, and never become will. 
^ . ,.„ Herbart differentiates desire from feeling in that 

Desire diner- _ _ ° 

entiated from feeling is a phase, " a temporary modification, of 
the existing presentations," 3 while desire is a move- 
ment through many such phases. The sections of this move- 
ment are feelings. 4 Bat he confesses " that the facts which 
we call feelings can only with the greatest difficulty be 
separated from those called desires and aversions." 5 He 
distinguishes between desire and interest in that " interest 

1 Empirische Psychologies Dr. Drbal, p. 281. 2 JEsthetic Bevelation of the 
World, p. 67. 3 Science of Education, p. 230. 4 Se^ Lindner's Lehrbuch 
d. Empirische JPsychologie, 6th Ed., p. 167. 5 Lehrbuch zur Fsycholoyie, 97. 



52 Intiodnclion to Herbarfs Science and Practice of Education 

depends upon a present object, while desire strives towards 
something in the future. " x 

_. Herbart clearly marks the distinction he draws 

Distinction J 

between^- between desire and will, when he defines desire as 
sire and will. i «• • t , • i • 

mere seli-mclination to an object, without the as- 
sumption that it will be reached. 2 Every volition involves 
desire, but not every desire is will ; there is a large region of 
desire which does not issue in a complete volitional process. 
Shylock, when first asked by Bassanio to lend the ducats to 
Antonio, has the desire for revenge, but no means of compassing 
it ; hence it seems impossible. The words, " If I can catch the 
villain on the hip, I will feed fat the ancient grudge I bear 
him," mark the course of the transition from desire to will. 
As the force of the if diminishes, the force of the will increases. 
When the process is complete, when the difficulties are so far 
overcome that Shylock " conquers the future in thought," and 
is almost certain of his revenge, desire has passed into will. It 
does so thus. At a later stage in his bargaining with Bassanio, 
he knows (or, as the event proves, thinks he knows) that if 
Antonio forfeits his bond, he will be in the power of the man 
who has granted it. If that power is to be Shylock's, he must 
take the risk that Antonio will pay the bond, and lend him the 
money. The following sequence is formed in Shylock's mind, 
which leads (in his case only apparently) to the attainment of 
his desire— (1) to conceal his hatred and lead the money; (2) 
to make the penalty of forfeiture a pound of flesh; (3) to exact 
the penalty. When the causal sequence comes to the aid of 
desire, will arises from it. " Witt, then, is a desire with the 
'presumption that it will attain i'S object" 2, u Whoever says 
' I will,' has already conquered for himself the future in 
thought." 4 
Desire pass- Whether, then, a desire passes into will depends, 
ing into will, according to Herbart, upon whether the individual 
sees or thinks he can attain his object. 5 But it is not neces- 

1 Science of Education, p. 129. 2 Ibid., p. 211. 

8 Lelirbuch zur Psychologie, 223. 4 Science of Education, p. 211. 

5 So also Pestalozzi, who says, as the result of his experience at 
Stanz, "Whatever awak;ns a child's powers, and enables him truly to 
say ' / can ' — all this he wills " (PestalozzL's letter to Gessner). 



Fsychology 53 



sary, in order that desire may pass into will, that what is longed 
for should be really attainable, only that it should appear to be 
so (as with Shylock). The foolish child wills where the man 
only longs. The will of the inexperienced youth goes far be- 
yond that of the man who has extensively tested his power of 
attaining what he desires. " Napoleon, when emperor, willed \ 
when at St. Helena, he desired" l 



1 Lehrbuch zur Psychologie, 107. 



CHAPTER II 

ETHICS 

Hertart's de- Ethics has been defined as the doctrine of human 

fimtion of i 

ethics. character, 1 and again as the doctrme of what ought to 
be so far as this depends on the voluntary action of individuals. 2 
By using the term u individual " in the second definition, 
ethics is provisionally distinguished from politics, which seeks 
to determine the proper constitution and the right public con- 
duct of governed societies. A definition of ethics as understood 
by Herbart must combine elements from both these definitions 
and may be stated thus : Ethics is the doctrine of human 
character so far as this depends on the voluntary action of in- 
dividuals, both as individuals and as members of the State. 
In Herbart's conception, the morality of the individual will 
ought also to regulate every form of social life : the family, the 
community, the Church, and the State. 

In considering human actions many appear to deserve disap- 
probation, others approbation ; many appear to us as good, 
others as bad. On the other hand, there is a class of actions in 
regard to which our judgment as to their badness or goodness 
is not aroused. If the head of an axe flies from the handle in 
the carpenter's grasp, and kills some one near, it never occurs to 
us to call the carpenter a criminal, because the accident hap- 
pens without (against) his will ; if a rich man throws away a 
pair of shoes, and a poor one finds and rejoices over them, we 
do not praise the former, because it is without his will that the 
latter receives the benefit. These examples serve to illustrate 
the truth, What is done without consciousness and tcithout will 
is neither good nor bad, but is in its moral aspect indifft rent. 
Acts, on the contrary, done consciously and with will, are sub- 

1 Types of Ethical Theory, Dr. Martineau, p. 1. 

2 Method of Ethics, Prof. Sidgvvick. 

54 



Ethics 55 



ject to moral judgment ; so likewise is will, even if it is pre- 
vented from coming forth in action. We disapprove when we 
see the intention to do another harm; we approve when there is 
the will to do another good. The concept of will implies action 
whenever possible, otherwise, as Herbart points out, it is no- 
thing but desire. 1 

Herbart defines the good will as " the steady re- 
' solution of a man to consider himself as an individual 
under the law which is universally binding." 2 In his system of 
ethics, as also in Kant's, it is the good will alone which has 
absolute value. Other things often characterized as good — 
intelligence, courage, wealth, power, honour — are but of relative 
worth. For they are, Herbart urges, only so many instruments 
of evil, if the will using tbem be bad. For him, as for Kant, 
11 there is nothing in the whole world, or indeed out of it, of 
which we can conceive, which can be taken without limitation 
as good, except the good will." 3 This truth is echoed in our 
own tongue in George Eliot's poem " The Spanish Gripsy " : — 

"No good is certain but the steadfast mind, 
The undivided will to seek the good." 

We must next inquire in what the goodness of the will, ac- 
cording to Herbart, consists. What is absolutely good cannot 
be limited by the relatively good. Hence the goodness of the 
will resides entirely in the nature of the willing, not in any 
object such as happiness, conformity to nature, etc., to which its 
efforts may be directed. Again, its worth resides wholly in its 
intrinsic force, not in the extrinsic success or failure of that 
force when it has passed into action. "Even if it accomplishes 
nothing, it shines for itself as a jewel, whose worth is in itself." 4 
Not the act, then, but the will is for Herbart the real object 
of ethical judgment. " The moral law, we may say, has to be 
expressed in the form, Be this, not Do this." 5 Far from 
estimating the goodness of the will by the extent of what it 
achieves, Herbart urges that the worth of its resultant acts 



1 Science of Education, p. 211. 2 ^Esthetic Revelation of the World, p. 57. 
3 Grundleyung zur Metaphysik der Mitten, Ausg v. Kirchmann, section 
110. 4 Ibid., Kant, p. 11. 5 Science of Ethics, Obs. 4, p. 155. 



56 Introduction to Herbarfs Science and Practice of Education 

must be measured by the purity of the will from which they 
spring. That Herbart's position is really true is evident from 
a very simple analysis. " The word ' action ' is a word of complex 
meaning, taking in the whole process from the first stir of 
origination in the agent's mind to the last pulsation of visible 
effect in the world. James Mill is fond of laying out its ele- 
ments into three stages : (1) the sentiments whence it springs ; (2) 
the muscular movements in which it visibly consists ; (3) the con- 
sequences in which it issues. Of these, cut off the first, and the 
other two lose all their moral quality ; the muscular movement 
becomes a spasm or sleep-walking ; the consequences become 
natural phenomena, pleasant, like fine weather, or terrible, like 
an incursion of wild beasts. But cut off the other two, and in 
reserving the first alone you save the moral quality entire ; 
though paralysis should bar the passage into outer realization, 
and intercept the consequences at their birth, still the personal 
record contains a new act, if only the inner mandate has been 
issued. The moment which completes the mental antecedents 
touches the character with a clearer purity or a fresh stain, nor 
can any hindrance, by simply stopping execution, wipe out the 
light and shade ; else would guilt return to innocence by being 
frustrated, and goodness go for nothing when it strives in 
vain." 1 This radical difference at once marks off Herbart's 
ethics from utilitarianism and eudemonism. 
The formation From this his conception of the good will's in- 
sfgiKne^rork wardness, Herbart derives the aim of his system of 
of education, education. " That aim is not by any means to develop 
a certain external mode of action, but rather insight together 
with corresponding volition in the mind of the pupil." 2 "That 
the ideas of the good and right in all their clearness and purity 
may become the essential objects of the will, that the inner- 
most intrinsic contents of the character shall determine itself 
according to these ideas, putting back all arbitrary impulses — 
this, and nothing less, is the aim of moral culture." 3 Thus the 
formation of the good will which is the union of volition and 



1 Types of Ethical Theory, Dr. Martinaau, vol. ii. p. 26. 

2 Science of Education, p. 111. 3 Ibid., p. 112. 



Ethics 57 



insight, and through that the building up of " character which 
is inner stability " l — this, according to Herbart, is the work 
of education. The teacher therefore must studiously inquire 
into the source of will and the factors upon which its forma- 
tion depends, that he may not leave the choice of the right 
means to chance. 
The circle of Through the clear and convincing medium of his 

thought as the & & 

source of will, psychology, Herbart teaches that the one and only 
source of will is the circle of thought. From it the good and 
bad will alike proceed. " The circle of thought contains the 
store of that which by degrees can mount by the steps of interest 
to desire, and then by means of action to volition." 2 

The circle of thought being for Herbart the source alike 
of insight and will, he concludes that "in the culture of the 
circle of thought the main part of education lies." 3 If his 
theory be true, it at once substantiates the vast scope and im- 
portance of the teacher's work. For he has the great responsi- 
bility, during many succeeding years, of the formation of that 
circle, and through it at the same time a large share in the 
formation of his pupil's will. 

Good and bad in Herbart's ethics are immutable contraries. 
That which is bad cannot be also good, and vice versd. The 
theft of Benedict, Abbot of Peterborough, when he stole the 
relics of Thomas a Becket from Canterbury Cathedral, did not 
become good because he gave the relics to his own cathedral 
of Peterborough. 4 The well-known proverb that " the end 
justifies the means " — that the end can make the means good 
when they themselves are bad — is false. Brutus pleaded that— 

"Pity to the general wrong of Rome 
Hath done this deed on Csesar." 5 

But even though his motive was absolutely pure— 

" He only in a general honest thought 
And common good to all made one of them n 
[the corspirators] 6 — 



1 Science of Education, p. 85. 2 Ibid., p. 213. 3 Ibid., p. 214. 

4 Memorials of Canterbury, Dean Stanley, p. 200. 

8 Julius Cdesar, Act III., Scene 1. 6 Ibid., Act V., Scene 5. 



58 Introduction to Herb art's Science and Practice of Education 

the means — " that great Julius bleed " — was not justified by 
the end — " for justice' sake." x 

The two classes Because good and bad are immutable contraries, 
•wwch\nfluence ^ ^oes not f°^ ow tnat a character containing bad 
the will. traits lias necessarily no good ones, nor that one con- 
taining good traits has therefore no bad ones. Character is a 
complex, and consequently can and does contain a mixture of 
good and bad. But for the single traits there is but one predi- 
cate. Jacob fed the hungry Esau because he thought it was 
to his advantage ; the Samaritan cared for the man fallen among 
thieves without thought of advantage or of reward. These 
examples illustrate the two classes of motives, interested and 
disinterested, which determine the will. Action in whatever 
form, which proceeds from an interested motive, is in Herbart's 
ethics absolutely without moral worth. For it is prompted 
by the thought of good or evil consequences to its doer, and the 
will which accompanies it is not judged for its own sake, but 
for the sake of what it will achieve. Such action is at its best 
eudemonistic— that is, done to create a feeling of satisfaction — 
and easily passes into selfishness akin to Jacob's, a disposition 
to benefit one's self even at the expense of another. " He in 
whom it takes the form of forsaking evil from fear of an aveng- 
ing God, or of doing good from hope of reward in a future life, 
is hardly even in the outer court of true morality." 2 " What 
we gain in disposition to right conduct, by the intermixture of 
Divine authority in motives to moral action, we lose in that 
action's moral worth." 3 Herbart here, as very frequently in his 
ethical doctrine, is in striking accord with Plato, who denies 
all character of goodness to actions done for the sake of ex- 
trinsic benefits, whether in this life or any other. 4 

1 Julius Ccesar, Act IV., S^ene 3. 

2 The Relation between Religion and Morality, Ballauf. 

3 Reliyionsphiloaophie , Drobisch, p. 148. 

4 " If you dare a little to-day from the prospect otherwise of greater 
terror to-morrow, your very bravery expresses only fear ; if you refrain 
from indulgence now that you may have a richer banquet hereafter, 
3'our very moderation is bat greediness : and that can be no true virtue 
which thus illicitly sets its heart on the very things it professes to re- 
nounce, and secretly worsbij s the idol it dethrones, but a mere slavish 
counterfeit of genuine goodness, whose attribute it is to stipulate for no 



Ethics 59 

Only in actions prompted by the second class of motives — 
the disinterested— can there, says Herbart, be any moral worth. 
In the good Samaritan doing the good irrespective of conse- 
quences beneficial or harmful, to himself, we see the moral will 
as Herbart and Kant conceived it. Its essence is expressed in 
the latter's words, "It is not enough for the moral man that 
his act is in harmony with the moral law ; it must in addition 
be done for the sake of that law." 

The intuitive I n their conception of the good will as the 
judgments, absolute good, and in their principle that will 
ought to be judged in consideration of its form alone, the 
philosophies of Kant and Herbart are in entire agreement. 
They differ in that which they assign as the basis of morality. 
For Kant it is the categorical imperative, for Herbart the 
intuitive judgments. 

The categorical imperative, the command "Thou shalt," given 
by reason to the will, is, says Kant, a universal law. Its uni- 
versality constitutes it the basis of morality, and obedience or 
disobedience to it forms the moral or immoral will. Herbart 
rejects the categorical imperative as the basis of ethics, on the 
ground of its derived origin. For he argues " Thou shalt " is 
a command, and all command is will. All will is equal in 
value ; therefore no particular will as will is superior to any 
other will, nor has any original right .to command. On the 
strength of this argument he relegates the categorical impera- 
tive to a secondary position, and his words " that it was a 
mistake to begin ethics with the categorical imperative Hl are 
explained. 

For it Herbart substitutes the intuitive judgments, which, 
he also calls sesthetic 2 judgments, as the basis of ethics. They 

wages to personal appetite or desire, but accept the intrinsically good 
for its own sake as the sterling coin, for which all else may fairly be 
exchanged away " (Plato's Republic, quoted by Dr. Martineau in Types 
of Ethical Theory, vol. i., p. 75). i Science of Education, p. 206. 

2 The student must carefully note Herbart's peculiar use of the term. 
" aesthetic " when applying it to the intuitive judgments. He did not 
man to identify the beautiful with the good, nor in any way to imply 
that the conception of the go d is deduced from that of the beautiful. 
As if to guard against any such misapprehension, he writes, "I assure 
my contemporaries that what I call moral taste has nothing in common 



60 Introduction to Herb art's Science and Practice of Education 

are independent of the will, and can estimate its value, and while 
neither issuing a command nor enforcing their claims, 1 yet give 
to command its authority, to obedience its value, to duty its 
obligation. 2 They are judgments of approval or disapproval 
springing up involuntarily when will, 3 with or without action as 
its expression, is considered. Not until a later stage — i.e., till 
the personality has yielded itself to them, and itself elevated 
them into commands from which ultimately a plan of life is 
formed 4 — do they acquire the nature of the categorical impera- 
tive. 5 The subject of these intuitive judgments, then, is the 
individual willing. That will, Herbart shows, is always in re- 
lationship, either to itself or to the wills of others. These 
relationships of will he found to be reducible to five ; they 
arouse the intuitive judgments either of approval, or their 
contrary, of disapproval. The concepts formed by the mind of 
those relationships which arouse approving judgments consti- 
tute what Herbart calls the five practical (that is, moral) ideas. 
11 From that which the involuntary judgment cannot help 
marking in an unqualified manner with approval or disapproval, 
the will takes law, the principle of order, and the object of its 
endeavours. That which was marked with involuntary appro- 
bation I call a practical idea." fi 

Before passing to the five relationships of will and the 
corresponding five practical ideas, the intuitive judgments, as 
existent in little children, may be briefly noticed. 

Intuitive judgments are undeveloped in the child, 

n ments in S ~ says Herbart, until called forth and exercised by 
children. ^ Q g-gj^ Q f g 0Q( j an( j ey j| actg> ^ g goon as h e 

acquires in the place of mere impulse the rudiments of a mora\ 
consciousness, he cannot help forming these judgments (on 

with the fashionable talk of the present day, and, moreover, is just as 
far from confusing the good with the beautiful, after the manner of the 
Stoic maxim, ' Only the beautiful is good ' " (Science of Education, p. 207). 
He extends the term " aesthetic " to the intuitive judgments, not because 
moral judgments and the judgments of art proper are in their nature 
identical, or in their origin one, but because they have certain pro- 
perties in common ; i.e., both spring up involuntarily, independently, 
and cannot be proved. 

i ^Esthetic Revelation of the World, p. 64. 2 Ibid., p. 63. 8 Ibid., p. 66. 

4 Ibid., p. 66. 5 Science of Education, p. 206. 6 Ibid,,'?. 209. 



Ethics 6 1 



individual actions to begin with) provided opportunity is 
offered to him by his environment. 1 At first mere feelings 
or general impressions (for the little child is only vaguely con- 
scious of what is worthy of praise or blame) they are indefinite, 
and often lead astray. They must therefore be developed into 
logically cultivated and clearly pronounced judgments, for upon 
them greatly depends the formation of moral character, the 
great end of education. 

That they may be thus developed, the child, under the guidance 
of parents and teacher, must learn to judge himself by having 
first seen and judged others, whom he meets with either in 
real life or in books. " The untroubled child," says Her bar t, 
" ought not to feel his existence, that he may not make that 
existence the measure of the importance of that which is outside 
him. Then, it is to be hoped, the clear perception of moral 
right and wrong will be amongst the observations he makes in 
the same way, and as he looks at others in this respect he will 
look at himself ; as the particular falls under the general, so 
will he find himself thrown under his own censorship. This is 
the natural beginning of moral culture, weak and uncertain in 
itself, but to be strengthened by instruction." 2 Herbart here 
applies to moral education a truth which Froebel constantly 
emphasizes and shows in action : that the child first becomes 
clear in his own feelings through the observation of external 
things. 3 

„. . , . . Ethical judgment then can be trained and de- 
Ethical judg- 7 i • n • ■> 

ments deve- veloped psychologically in the same wav as 
loped by the . _ r , r J . °,. / , , , J 

relationships of judgments ol art, the tormer through the observa- 

6 W1 ' tion by the individual of actions as expressions of 

will, the latter by a like observation of forms, colours, etc. 

The judgments of art treat of the relationships of tones, lines, 

colours, etc., the intuitive judgments of relationships of the 

will. As specimens of lines, colours, forms, cannot be judged 

individually, but only in their relationships to each other, so 

a will, which, as we shall hereafter see, has two sides, cannot 



^Esthetic Revelation of the World, p. 71. 2 Science of Education. 

See Froebel's Mutter und Kose Lieder (Beckoning the Chickens). 



62 Introduction to Herbarfs Science and Practice of Education 

be judged alone, but only in the relationship of those two sides 
to each other, or in their relationship to "the will of another or 
others. These additional resemblances strengthened the simi- 
larity 1 Herbart had already detected between the judgments of 
art and the intuitive judgments, and led him, in extending the 
term " aesthetic " to both, to define aesthetics as the doctrine of 
the morally as well as of the artistically beautiful. A relation- 
ship of will, then, requires at least two wills. These two wills 
may be existent (a) in one and the same individual, or (b) in two 
or more individuals. The first class contains two, the second class 
three kinds of volitional relationships, a total of five relation- 
ships ; and as their expression there are five moral 
The five practi- t. ' TT . x . n ., ■ m . 

cai (moral) (called by Herbart also practical) ideas. The two 



in the first class are the ideas of inner freedom 
and of perfection ; the three in the second class are the ideas 
of benevolence, of right, and of equity. 

The two wills The accumulated experience of all mankind from 
in one person. ^ e earliest times proves that there exist two wills 
in each individual, one commanding, the other obeying or dis- 
obeying, as the case may be. These wills are often in conflict, 
the one inducing, warning, and forbidding, the other alluring 
by promise of pleasure or terrifying by fear of pain. This 
contest in the soul has been the theme of great poets and 
dramatists in all ages. It was experienced by St. Paul, 2 de- 
scribed by Wieland in The Choice of Hercules, 3 by Goethe 
in Faust, 4 " by Tennyson, as he indicates, in his Idylls of the 

1 See note 2 , p. 59. 

2 " The flesh histeth against the Spirit, and the Spirit lusteth againot 
the flesh, and they are ac enmity one with another " (Gal. v. 17). 

8 " Zwei Seelen — ach ich fuhl es so gewiss — 

Bakampfen sich in meiner Brust 

Mit gleicher Kraft. 

Arete " (the goddess of virtue) 
u Errothe Hercules. 

Errothe vor dir selbst. Die bessre Seele 

Bist Du. Sie ist allein dein wahres selbst; 

Wag es zu wollen, und der Sieg ist dein." 
* " Zwei Seelen wohnen, ach ! in meiner Brust, 

Die eine will sich von der andern trennen; 

Die eine halt, in derber Liebeslust 

Sich an die Welt, rait klammernd n Organen; 



Ethics 6 3 



King, 1 while the story of Christ's temptation in the wilder- 
ness is a poetical representation of the conflict in its highest form. 

The two wills are denned by Herbartin the third 
subjective book of the Science of Education, on moral strength 

of character, as the objective and subjective wills. 
The objective will, based on the natural desires, inclinations, 
and passions of the child, is unstable and impetuous, and in 
largely concerned with external things ; the subjective or 
commanding will, based on the intuitive judgments (which 
the child passes first on others and then on himself), grows 
up parallel to the other will, till the slow "pressure which 
men call conscience" 2 rules, or should rule, the man. The 
adjustment by the individual of these two wills to each 
other supplies the idea of inner freedom (first moral idea). 
The idea of Inner freedom, is harmony beticeen the objective 
inner freedom. w m^ an d f ne subjective icill founded on insight. 
It does not consist in a mere self-determination of the will, 
but in its determination under such independence of sensuous 
incitement as is bound up with dependence on the moral. 
This does not imply the annihilation of the objective will, but 
only its gradual subjection to the subjective, till ultimately 
the man always acts from the higher law. The will is only 
free, when it has passed from under the yoke of the lower 
desires and passions, to submit to the good and serve it in the 
future. We are not truly free when we would will, only when 
we would will the right. Herbart's idea of inner freedom — 
knowledge of the good, and willing submission to its guidance 
— finds its perfect expression in Christ's words, " Ye shall 
know the truth, and the truth shall make you free." In his 
teaching the subjective will is presented to men as the " will 
of God," and their subjection thereto as " the perfect life." 

Die andre hebt gewaltsam sieh vom Duft 
Zu dnn G-efilden hoher Ahnen '* (Faust, first part). 
The parallelism here between Goethe and Wieland. his predecessor, 
whom he admired and extensively studied, is remarkable. 
1 " Accept this old imperfect tale, 

Now old, and shadowing sense at war with soul, 
Hather than that grey thing w 
{Idylls of the King, Tennyson, Dedication to the Queen). 
* JEsthetic Revelation of the World, p. 66. 



64 Introduction to Herbarfs Science and Practice of Education 

Like Christ, Herbart saw in his subjective will the will of God, 
not as a law imposed on men from without, but as the welling 
up of the Divine will within the soul, aud with Christ he 
appeals directly to it. 

A picture of inward conflict, of disharmony between the ob- 
jective will, and the subjective will founded on insight, is given 
by Tennyson in the Cranmer of his Queen Mary. Cranmer 
having become a pervert from Protestantism to Roman Catholi- 
cism, was nevertheless sentenced to be burned by the Catholic 
queen. He cries in reference to his recantation, — ■ 

" There ba writings I have set abroad 
Against the truth I knew within my heart, 
Written from fear of death to save my life." 

The subjective will of Cranmer, terrified by " the fear of 
death " set up by the objective will, was not free to follow " the 
truth " (moral insight) " he knew." But the hour came when 
he made himself free from that fear raised by the objective, 
and renouncing the writings, Cranmer now, in obedience to 
" the truth he knew," — 

" As the helmsman at the helm 
Steers, ever looking to the happy haven 
Where he shall rest at night, moved 
To his death." 

The idea of inner freedom has no place in the little child, for 
the terms of the relationship are as yet non-existent in him. 
He has not even the right insight which is the foundation of 
the commanding will, much less that will itself. " The 
mother's tender care, the father's kind seriousness, the relation- 
ship of the family, the order of the house " x — all this the child 
observes and judges. By such judgments he prepares himself 
to discern, and by obedience to those he honours prepares him- 
self to obey the higher law of obedience— the idea of inner 
freedom. The promise in the child of that idea — of the growth 
of insight and of the gradual triumph of the subjective over 
that which ought to be subdued in the objective will — is sketched 
by George Eliot in her poem " The Brother and Sister " : — 

1 JExthetic Revelation of the World, p. 71. 



Ethics 65 



*' Thus boyish will the nobler mastery learned 
Where inward vision over impa'se reigns; 
Widening its life with separate life discerned 
A Like unlike, a Self that self restrains." 

The idea of The Idea of Perfection (second moral idea). — 
perfection. The harmony between the will and right insight 
arouses our approval. Reuben, desiring to save Joseph, yielded 
to the insight his brothers avoided, and thus conformed to the 
idea of inner freedom ; yet he was wanting. He had not 
the necessary power of will to oppose his brothers, and this 
want of energy of will arouses the disapproval of the intuitive 
judgment. The character of the Apostle Paul was the direct 
opposite of Reuben's. Not only were his will and his insight 
that the Gospel must be preached to the heathen at one, but he 
strained every nerve to realize this unity in action. Ever 
"passing over," he was constantly impelled by the one thought 
of the need to spread " the word " quickly, and his will to 
press forward to "those that sit in darkness" grew in strength 
with years. This " onward, ever onward," is the solution of 
his life. What is the relationship of will contained in it ? 
This : the obeying {objective) will strove to reach the strength 
of the commanding {subjective) will, and in so doing expressed 
the idea of perfection. If the commanding will be expressed 
by 5, and the obeying will by 1, the latter is obviously weaker 
than the former. If, however, the obeying will reaches succes- 
sively the degrees of strength expressed by 2, 3, 4, 5, its power 
at length equals that of the commanding will. The command- 
ing will mounts a degree — to 6 — and the obeying will follows it. 
The objective is thus ever striving to reach the strength of the 
subjective, and since the potentiality of strength in the subjec- 
tive is unlimited, the power of the obeying w T ill is so likewise. 
In other words, it strives to reach our ideal: "zum hochsten 
Dasein immerfort zu streben." 1 In the Dorothea of Middle- 
march, the idea is shown in action as the motive power of the 
life. " She yearned towards the perfect right, that it might 
make a throne within her, and rule her errant will." 2 " She " 

1 Faust, rJoRthp, second part. 

2 ididdtmarch, (jieuige Eliot, chap, lxxx., p. 080. 



66 Introduction to Herbarfs Science and Practice of Education 

— the subjective will united with the good element in the objec- 
tive — " yearned " — the idea of perfection — u to the perfect 
right " — the ideal — " her errant will " — the lower claims of the 
objective. As we rise nearer to the ideal, the nature of the 
latter is to mount higher. 

" A man's reach should exceed his grasp, 
Or what's a heaven for? " x 

Thus, since the will seeks to attain its full strength, the indi- 
vidual is led to act more and more in accordance with the idea 
of perfection. 

The ideas of inner freedom and of perfection, taken together 
to the exclusion of the ideas still to be consider 3d, do not neces- 
sarily produce the moral will. The idea of inner freedom re- 
quires harmony of the will with insight, but if the insight 
errs in its conception of the good, it will lead the will astray. 
Again, the power of the will which the idea of perfection re- 
quires may arouse the approving judgment, while its direction 
and therefore' its resultant acts will arouse disapproval. This 
is abundantly illustrated in history. " There is no instance 
on record of an ignorant man who, having good intentions and 
supreme power to enforce them, has not done far more evil 
than good." 2 

The two relationships of will already considered have been 
illustrated as existent in one individual, and, accurately speak- 
ing, they must be so. An individual, it is true, may try to 
make his will the copy of another and to reach it in strength, 
but in doing so, it is merely the prototype of his will, not that 
will itself, which is external to him. Therefore he still only 
illustrates the idea of inner freedom and of perfection. The 
remaining three moral ideas, on the other hand, must be sought 
for in the relationships between the wills of two different in- 
dividuals. 
The idea of The Idea of Benevolence (third moral idea) is the 
benevolence, disinterested devotion of the individual will to the 
tvill (or the ivelfare) of another or others. The story of Pesta- 
lozzi's life of devotion to humanity is almost as well known in 

1 Andrea del Sarto, Robert Browning. 2 Buckle, His'ory of Civilization. 



Ethics 67 



England as in his native land. To realize the great dream of 
his life — to elevate the children of the poor by education — no 
sacrifice was for him too heavy, no effort too great. Often re- 
duced to extreme poverty and ill-health, rewarded by the con- 
tempt and ingratitude of the people, the parents of the children 
he loved and lived to help, he worked on, strong in the faith as 
he tells us, that " a more fortunate posterity will take up the 
thread of my hopes at the place where it is now broken." Of 
his life with these little waifs and strays, " his children," he 
writes, " I had about me neither family, friends, nor servants, 
nothing but them. I was with them in sickuess and in health, 
and when they slept. We wept and smiled together. They 
forgot the world and Stanz ; they only knew that they were 
with me, and I with them. It was from me that they re- 
ceived all that could do them good, soul and body. All needful 
help, consolation, and instruction they received direct from me. 
Their hands were in mine ; my eyes were fixed on theirs. . . . 
Many and many a time have I gone without a dinner, and eaten 
in bitterness a dry crust of bread on the road, at a time when 
even the poorest were seated around a table. All this I have 
suffered, and am still suffering to-day " (Pestalozzi was then 
fifty-five years old), " and with no other object than the reali- 
zation of my plans for helping the poor." 1 This disinterested 
devotion to the welfare of others arouses the instant approval 
of the intuitive judgment Pestalozzi, whose life had expressed 
in action Herbart's idea of benevolence, gathered up towards 
its close the very essence of that idea in these words : "I live 
no longer for myself ; I lose myself in the love of my brethren, 
the children of my God." 2 

The contrary of the idea of benevolence — i.e., the idea of 
malevolence — arouses, on the other hand; the immediate disap- 
proval of the intuitive judgment. Malevolence exists in its 
most hateful form, when an individual, angered at another at- 
taining that which is unattainable by himself, works against 
him, not because he can gain what the other possesses, but be- 



1 Life of Pestalozzi. translated by E.. Russell. 

2 Memoir of Pestalozzi, Dr. Biber, p. 467. 



68 Introduction to Herbaifs Science and Practice of Education 

cause he desires to prevent that other from continuing in his 
possession. In this form the idea of malevolence exists in the 
Satan of Paradise Lost : — 

" Sight hateful, sight tormenting; thus these two, 
Imparadised in one another's arms, 
The happier Eden, shall enjoy their fill 
Of bliss on bliss ; while I to hell am thrust, 
Where neither joy nor love . . . Live while ye may, 
Yet happy pair ; enjoy, till I return, 
Short pleasures, for long woes are to succeed." 

{Paradise Lost, Book IV.) 

Herbart identifies the idea of benevolence with " the abso- 
lute good which our religion calls love." Our greatest religious 
poet has done so also. 1 The idea forms a cardinal part of the 
creeds of Buddha 2 and Confucius, 3 and stands out prominently 
in the teaching of Jesus, 4 whose human life itself was the 
realization of perfect love. 

In two somewhat obscure passages 5 Herbart treats of the 
part these ideas of perfection and benevolence ought to play in 
the relationships between the wills of teacher and pupil. 

The idea of perfection, as he conceives it, contains three at- 
tributes : intension, 6 extension, and concentration of will. Her- 
bart shows that there is little intension and still less concen- 
tration of will in the child, and therefore that extension of the 
will — that is its direction to a variety of objects — mainly occu- 
pies the efforts of both teacher and pupil. Such extension of 
the will over a variety of objects is, in other words, the forma- 

1 " Add love, 
By name to come call'd charity, the soul 
Of all the rest ; then wilt thou not he loath 
To leave this Paradis-, but shalt possess 
A paradise within thee, happier far." 

{Paradise Lost, Book XII.) 
9 "Let the love that fills the mother's breast as she watches over her 
child animate all." 

3 " Do unto another what you would he should do unto you, and do 
not unto another what you would not should be done unto you. Thou 
only needest this law alone ; it is the foundation and principle of all 
the rest." 

* " Lo\ e one another, as Christ hath lov^d you." " Love your enemies ; 
bless them that curse you; do good to them that hate you." 

5 ft"ience of Education, pp. 100. 110. 

6 Herbart uses the term intension, and denotes by it energy of will. 



Ethics 69 



tion of the many-sided interest, which is so powerful a factor 
in Herbart's system of education. 

"The teacher must represent the future man in the boy; con- 
sequently the aims which the pupil will as an adult place 
before himself in the future, must be the present care of the 
teacher. He must prepare beforehand an inward facility for 
attaining them." In other words, the teacher must prepare 
the boy by the cultivation of his will to answer in its in- 
tension, extension, and concentration, to the demands his ideal 
will make upon him when a man. 

"The objective of these aims as matter of mere choice has 
absolutely no interest for the teacher. 1 Only the will of the 
future man himself, and consequently the sum of the claims 
which he, in and with this will, will make on himself, is the 
object of the teacher's goodwill (benevolence) ; while the 
power, the initiative inclination, the activity, which the future 
man will have wherewith to meet these claims on himself, form 
for the teacher matter for consideration and judgment in 
accordance with the idea of perfection." That is to say, the 
teacher can and will measure the demands which the moral 
will, he is to help the boy to form in himself, will make upon 
him when he becomes a man. Then, inspired by goodwill (the 
idea of benevolence), he will, as its definition sets forth, " in 
disinterested devotion to the will of another," help the boy to 
accumulate, by his own active choice between good and ill and 
by his many-sided interest, that store of power which he (the 
teacher) sees will be demanded of him by the idea of per- 
fection. It is a store which, in accordance with that idea, will 
increase in maturer years in proportion as it responds to the 
ever higher demands of insight enforced by the subjective will. 

1 " Whatever arts and requirements a young man may learn from a 
teacher for the mere sake of profit, are as indifferent to the educator as 
the colour he chooses for his coat " (Science of Education, p. 84). In the 
principle that the teacher should, in the interest of his pupil, choose 
the knowledge he gives for its power to form character, and not for 
its practical utility, Herbart and Froebel are at one. " It has an ex- 
tremely injurious, weakening effect on a boy if he is early given an 
aim toward which to strive, a something foreign to and outside of him- 
self to imitate, such as, for example, training for a certain profession, 
a c rtain sphere of action'' (Education of Man, Froebel, s.ction 22). 



7<d Introduction to Her barfs Science and Practice of Education 

The idea of benevolence, like the idea of inner freedom, has 
no place in the mind of the little child. Sympathy with the 
joys and pains of those immediately surrounding him must 
prepare the way for its recognition and acceptance. Since 
fellow-feeling is only generated, to begin with, in a small circle, 
in the family and in the home that benevolence must be 
learned, which is afterwards to extend beyond them. "Let 
discipline see that children feel much with each other, that 
they are companions in joy and sorrow." 1 In the perfect 
family life Herbart sees "the most perfect earthly expression 
of the Divine." 2 With the knowledge born of cherished 
memories, George Eliot, in " The Brother and Sister," sketched 
the beauty and potency of this family life as Herbart con- 
ceived it, reflecting itself back upon and forming the inner life 
of the little child, and preparing room therein for the larger 
idea of benevolence. 

" Our mother bade us keep the trodden ways, 

Stroked down my tippet, set my brother's frill 
Then, with the beiediction of her gaze, 
Clung to us less'ning, and pursued us still. 

" Those hours were seed to all my after-good ; 

My infant gladness through eye, ear, and touch, 
Took easily as warmth a -various food 

To nourish the sweet skill of loving much'. 
And were another childhood world my share, 
I would be born a little sister there." 

The idea of The Idea of Right (fourth moral idea). — Where 
rigllt - two wills express themselves in action, the sphere 
of that action common to both, is the external world. It con- 
tains the objects which supply some of the needs of every 
human being, and it often happens that the wills of two indi- 
viduals are fixed on the possession of the same object. This 
can take place, as Hobbes has shown in his Leviathan, (1) when 
man is in a state of nature, which is a state of war, and (2) 
when he is in a state of peace, "into which he enters from 
fear of death, from desire of such things as are necessary to 
commodious living, and from a hope by his industry to obtain 

* Science of Education, p. 262. 2 JEdhetic Revelation of the IVorld, p. 71. 



Ethics 7 1 



them." In the first state Herbart's idea of right could not 
exist. " Where there is no law there is no injustice, and where 
there is no right there can be no adherence to or deviation 
from it; it is consequent to the same condition that there be 
no propriety in dominion, no ' mine ' and 'thine ' dist'nct, but 
only that to be every man's that he can get, and for as long as 
he can keep it." 1 

In this state, if two wills were fixed on the same object, the 
strongest would obtain it. Force, and not the idea or law of 
right, would make the award. But in the second state — that 
of peace — man relinquishes this natural right, " that he shall 
take who has the power, and he shall keep who can," and is 
contented with so much liberty against other men, as he would 
like them to have against himself. " Reason suggesteth con- 
venient articles of peace upon which men may be drawn to 
agreement." 2 These "articles of peace " supply Herbart's idea 
of right. For example, in the earliest form of English society 
of which we catch traces we learn, that "the homesteads 
of the freemen clustered round a moot-hill or round a sacred 
tree, where the whole community met to administer its own 
justice, and frame its own law T s. Here the strife of farmer with 
farmer was settled, according to the customs (laws) of the 
settlement as its earldormen stated them." 3 These " customs " 
formed the norm which regulated the action of individual 
wulls. When that norm was disregarded, strife broke out, 
as, for instance, when one man tried to extend his own bound- 
ary by encroaching on his neighbour's land. Such a strife 
of wills, whenever occurring, arouses the disapproval of the 
intuitive judgment. While the appointed boundaries were 
kept, each submitted himself to the idea of right, which is 
thus the agreement of two or more wills ^expressed as a law 
to prevent strife. Herbart takes as its motto, " To every man 
his own." 4 

The distinction between malevolence and maleficence or 
active strife is, that in the latter the one will would probably 



1 Leviathan, Hobb3s, Part I. 2 Ibid, Part I. s Short History of the 
English People, Green, chap. i. 4 Science of Education, p. 250. 



7 2 Introduction to Herbarfs Science and Practice of Education 

never have come into collision with the other will but for the 
existence of some object desired by both, while in the former 
the desire to harm another is the sole incentive to action. 
The idea of The Idea of Equity (fifth moral idea) is that the 
equity. oene fit or harm intentionally done by one will to 
another must be returned to the will which originated it, either 
in some form of recompense or 'punishment. Herbart takes as 
its motto, "To every man what he deserves." 1 For example, 
when Christ healed the ten lepers, one returned to give Him 
thanks, while the remaining nine passed thanklessly on their 
way. The action of the former arouses a judgment of approval, 
of the latter disapproval. The kindness conferred on the 
lepers by the will of Christ, was returned by one in the form of 
gratitude, and unreturned by the remaining nine ; hence a 
false relationship or preponderance of benefit on one side was 
created. Again, if one will seeks to harm another — for in- 
stance, to injure the honour of another — our judgment of dis- 
approval is aroused, and only ceases when that injury returns in 
some form on its originator. Thus Arthur, measuring the 
extent of the wrong done to his honour by the unfaithfulness 
of Guinevere, given in return for his boundless trust in her, 
cries, — 

" Thou hast spoiled the purpose of my life ; 
The loathsome opposite 

Of all my soul had destined, did obtain, 

And all through thee.'' 2 

The wrong, in accordance with the idea of equity, rolls back 
upon the Queen, and Arthur pronounces her deserved punish- 
ment : — 

" I shall never come again, 
. . . See thee no more. w 

But the idea of equity also requires the true adjustment of 
recompense or punishment, otherwise the approval of the intui- 
tive judgment will cease, and even recoil. Here the idea of 
equity requires that the sins of time, however black, shall only 



1 Science of Education, p. 260. 

8 Guinevere: Idylls of the King, Tennyson. 



Ethics 73 



be visited with the punishments of time, and Arthur, who, 
uttering the idea before, gave voice to its justice in condem- 
nation, now pronounces its justice in mercy. Thinking of the 
time when the Queen shall pass — 

" To where beyond these voices there is peace," 

he, the spotless knight, 

" Who honoured his own word as if his God's," 

speaks thus : — 

" Perchance, and so thou purify thy soul, 
And so thou lean on our fair Father Christ, 
Hereafter, in the world where all are pare, 
We two may meet before high God, and thou 
Wilt spring to me and claim me thine" 

With this the series of the original practical ideas 
T1 Sa?Zfiidls S closes. The idea of perfection is termed formal, 

material* because it only relates to the form of the moral ; 
those of benevolence, right, and equity, are 
material. Otherwise expressed, it may be said that corre- 
sponding to the material ideas, there are three virtues : love, 
righteousness, and justice. The idea of perfection registers 
their degrees of strength, while the idea of inner freedom is 
their necessary presumption. 

The idea of perfection, as we have already seen, has its place 
in Herbart's system of education, as forming one relationship 
of will between teacher and pupil. 1 In dealing with moral 
strength of character he passes it over, because it is formal. 2 
In the same book he combines the two ideas of right and 
equity under the term " rectitude,' 1 (Rechtlichkeit), and means 
by it conformity to a moral standard. For benevolence 
(Wohlwollen) he sometimes substitutes goodness. 3 

The five ideas taken in their totality supplv the 

The five ideas ■ > a rr J 

combined concept of morality. Their due and relative pro- 

supply the . . r 

concept of portion to each other, Herbart points out, must 
be strictly observed, for the sacrifice of one or 

» Science of Education, p. 81. 2 Ibid., p. 210. s Ibid., pp. 210, 259, 263. 



74 Introduction to Herbarfs Science and Practice of Education 

more to the rest, disturbs the balance of a well-ordered life. 
For example, the idea of equity taken by itself would be the 
barbaric Levitical precept and law, " An eye for an eye and a 
tooth for a tooth." Only when the idea of benevolence tempers 
its rigour, when the idea of inner freedom determines the mode 
of its enforcement, the idea of right subordinates it to law, and 
the idea of perfection dictates its strength, does it determine 
the will towards morality. Herbart refers to a similar dis- 
turbance of balance when, the idea of benevolence being ab- 
sent, the idea of inner freedom is dominant. " If the idea of 
benevolence is wanting, inner freedom will take pride in its 
coldness, and thereby with perfect justice will shock the warm- 
hearted and benevolent." x 

"In practical " (moral) "philosophy " says Herbart, 

Duty based on ., . . t 1 .> -, . , n ' J , . , , 

the practical it is shown that duty is based upon practical " 

(moral) " ideas. These latter possess an eternal 
youth, and through this feature they become gradually separated 
from the class of wishes and enjoyments that grow weaker 
with time, and are recognized as the only unchangeable things 
which can answer the requirements of a law to the inner man. 
Besides, they bear in themselves the stamp of an inevitable 
decree, because a man positively cannot escape that judgment 
whose general form they indicate ; hence in those practical 
ideas are to be found the necessary contents which must fill 
up the general form of self-legislation." 2 

The five derived From the five original, Herbart deduced five 
ideas. derivative ideas. They are the extension and 
application of the original ideas to society. The idea of 
right supplies through jurisprudence the idea of civil right, 
the idea of equity, that of penal right. From the idea of 
benevolence is derived that of an administrative system, for 
every member of society must contribute as much as possible 
to the welfare of the whole, that the State may be prosperous 
and well administered. The idea of perfection supplies that 
of a s} r stem of culture, wherein each member of society con- 
tributes his part towards the culture of the whole. Finally, 

1 Science of Education, p. 264. 2 Lehrbuch zur Psychologies p. 233. 



Ethics 7 5 



from the idea of inner freedom is derived that of an ideal 
society. It is the subordination of the individual to the 
collective will, the latter being determined by the moral ideas. 
To Herbart, as these sociological ideas prove, the State was 
no mere political body, whose power is to be limited to the 
administration of justice and defence of law and order etc., but 
is a corporation which by its benevolent administration, its 
furtherance of moral culture, its protection of individual freedom 
consistent with social order, and its elevation of the general 
tone of the community, should make itself felt as a moral 
force. 

Virtue, according to Herbart, is the perfect harmony of 
character with all the moral ideas. If a will is not subject 
to them spontaneously, but requires to be attracted to them, 
the concept of duty or law is formed. For an absolutely holy 
will, there is neither law nor duty. 

It is often maintained that ethics are based on 
lationto the doctrines of religion, and therefore do not form 
rengion. ^ independent science. This cannot be too strongly 
combated. 1 But, on the other hand, it must be allowed that 
religion plays a most important part in the development of 
moral character. He who does the good only from the fear or 
hope of a future life is certainly far from being truly moral ; 
but he who accustoms himself to withstand the desires of the 
moment, and to consider and hearken to the claims of the 
ideal, may ultimately become obedient to those demands for the 
sake alone of their intrinsic worth. " As the child : s blind 
obedience to the teacher's and parent's authority forms a 
necessary stepping-stone to true morality, so humanity is led 
to the same end, by regarding the obligations of the moral ideas 
as the commandments of a law-giver- feared at first, but 
ultimately loved above all. The way to morality goes, with but 
few exceptions, only through law." 2 

Religion need- Even when a higher stage of moral culture has 
fui to morality. been reached, man cannot live without the support 

1 u There are many religions, but there is only one morality, which. 
has been, is, and must be for evt r, an instinct in the hearts o'' aU civilized 
men'' (Relation of Art to Religion, John J&uskin). 2 Bailauf. 



76 Introduction to Herbarfs Science and Practice of Education 

of religion. He is to will the good, but willing, as we have 
seen, is only possible when success appears attainable. With- 
out this presumption, confident action is impossible, for 
energy is paralyzed by the fear of failure. In the many 
instances then where success seems doubtful, human will to 
compass the good would be impossible unless it possessed a 
motive power beyond itself : faith in " the assistance of the 
highest Being, whose wise purposes are so ordered, that the 
good shall reign in us and in society." 

The whole tone of Herbart's life and work proves, 

Herbart's con- -, ,-, -, . ,. . . ■ . 1 " ' 

ception of that Uod immanent in nature was to him the great 

e lsl0a ' reality. Religion as the relation of man to his 

Creator, as the effort of the human soul to approach Grod, made 

up for him the great central fact of history, the illuminating 

light in which he interpreted the past, lived in the present, and 

gathered hope for the future. " God, the Father of men and 

Lord of the world," he writes, "must fill the background 

of memory. His must be an immovable place amongst the 

earliest thoughts 1 on which the personality of the growing man 

fastens." 2 Hence he attaches supreme importance to the 

cultivation of the religious spirit in the little child. "Religion 

will never occupy that tranquil place in the depths of the 

heart which it ought to possess, if its fundamental ideas are 

not among the earliest which belong to recollection, if it is 

not bound up and blended with all which changing life 

leaves behind in the centre of the personality." 3 The most 

favourable conditions to its perfect growth are to be found, 

says Herbart, not in the school, but in the home. On the use 

of religious instruction he writes, " Education must look upon 

religion not as objective, but as subjective. Religion befriends 



1 Compare Froebel : " Genuine, true, living religion, abiding in danger 
and in combat, in oppression and in need, in pleasure and in joy, must 
come to man in infancy. . . . Religiousness, fervid living in God 
and with. Gorl in all conditions and circumstances of life, which does not 
thus grow up from childhood with man, is later only with extreme diffi- 
culty raised to full vigorous life; while, on the contrary, a religious sense 
thus germinated and fostered amid all the storms and dangers of life 
will gain the vi-.tory " (Edu< ation of Man, p. 16). 2 ^Esthetic Revelation 
of the World, p. 72. 3 Science of Education, p. 179. 



Ethics 77 

and protects; nevertheless it must not be given to the child 
too circumstantially. Its work must be directing rather than 
teaching ; it must never exhaust susceptibility, and therefore, 
above all, must not be prematurely made use of. Nor must it 
be given dogmatically to arouse doubt, but in union with know- 
ledge of nature and the repression of egotism. 1 It must ever 
'point beyond, but never instruct beyond the bounds of know- 
ledge, for then the paradox would follow that instruction 
knows what it does not know." 2 His conviction that such 
teaching could be but imperfectly given within the narrow 
and unsatisfactory limits of school lessons, he expresses in the 
following words : (in reading them we are almost forced to the 
conclusion, that the modern Herbartian school, in assigning to 
the objective lesson in religion the central place in its scheme 
of instruction, has departed from the spirit of its founder) 
" Manifold as may be the resting-places of diverse minds, 
simple enough is that which should be the resting-place of 
them all: religion. But here your society appears to be led 
to a false conclusion. It says, much too small a place is 
assigned to religious instruction ; that means much too little 
time : it is only looked upon as a secondary study. But it 
does not follow that that to which little time is assigned is 
necessarily considered as a secondary study, and will be treated 
as such. How would it be if the size of the place assigned 
the goods and chattels in a house were determined by their 
value ? How large a space must the jewellery then fill. But 
the precious stones would refuse to take it; it is their nature 
to concentrate their great worth in a very little space. I can- 
not otherwise judge of religion. I know and acknowledge 
that it must form the deepest foundation and one of the earliest 
beginnings of human, even of child culture, without which all 
else is vain. I do not say this to-day for the first time ; I 
said it in the first of my educational writings, and, if I am not 
mistaken, often and emphatically enough. But I am alarmed 
at a religious instruction which stretches out into a multitude 

1 For Herbart's thoughts on the direction of religious growth at a 
later stage see Science of Education, p. 162. 

2 Aphorismen zur Padagogik. 



78 Introduction to HerbarPs Science and Practice of Education 

of special lessons, just as alarmed as at an extended formula 
of belief, which sets forth in many articles how the heart of man 
is to approach the Divine. And for a long time I have been 
frightened at the modern recommendations of religion, which 
very visibly have their origin in the misfortunes and miseries 
of late years. Amidst these miseries, we seem to have for- 
gotten all which knowledge of humanity, the history of 
the Church, the history of philosophy, combine to teach, 1 
namely, that every ladder towards heaven with accurately 
numbered rungs, which are to be mounted methodically one 
after the other, is useless to satisfy the universal need of 
religion. Further, the genuine professors of religion have 
often extremely few articles of belief, and those who search 
most diligently declare, that what we know of religion, what 
consequently we can in the true sense learn and teach, con- 
tracts itself into a few very simple supporting principles of a 
reasonable belief. These are my conclusions." 2 

Religion then, as Herbart conceived it, is to be in 

Religion in its . . i .. ,.,,, , ., -, , . , - 

relation to the the mam to the little child, not the nourishment of 
occasional lessons given to him like his meals at 
stated times, but as the air he breathes. It is to be, as it 
were, an atmosphere, quiet, penetrating, all-pervading, as 
necessary to his higher existence as the air to his bodily life, 
and almost as unconsciously received. In the midst of the 
family life, 3 " that which in the whole visible world is the most 

1 Written at the close of the Napoleonic wars. 

2 Notes on an educational essay read before the Society of Teachers, 
June. 1814. 

3 On the influence of the family life on the child, compare Froebel 
with Herbart. " Family life," says the former, " you are the 
sanctuary of humanity ; you are the most holy thing there is for the 
care of all that is Divine. Without you what are altar and Church ? 
What are they, when you do not consecrate them and raise soul, 
heart, disposition and mind, idea and thought, action and life, in all 
your members to the altar and temple of the one living G-od, to the 
awed understanding of all His manifestations, and to the carrying 
out of their demands?" (Mutter unci Kose Lieder, Picture 16). Herbart, 
while duly estimating the mighty influence of parents over their 
children, leaves unnoticed the extent and significance of that which 
parents in their turn receive from their children. He does not seem 
to have recogniz d that reciprocity of the relationship which Fruebdl 
saw and emphasized thus : " Fathers, parents, come let our children 



Ethics 79 



beautiful and most worthy," the child should picture Providence 
in the image of his parents, and from them idealized he would 
learn the attributes of the Deity. As long as possible the religious 
feeling, which ought from the earliest years to depend on the 
single thought Providence, must be preserved undisturbed. 
Herbart saw keenly the danger lurking for a child in too much 
direct religious teaching and too many religious exercises, i.e., 
that " they tended to make the idea of God wearisome to him," 
so that in after- years, when the man needed that idea in its full 
vitality for his safety in the storms of life, it would be no longer 
unspoiled. Prom the perfect family life, Herbart taught there 
was but one step upwards possible : to God ; and this step for 
the little child should be chiefly made through the indirect 
discipline of daily loving duty, fulfilled under the father's 
kind authority and the mother's tender care. Later, when 
many-sided culture has aroused inquiry, the boy and youth 
must be shown "the fruitless attempts of mature minds at 
all times to find fixed doctrines in religion." 1 In the " order of 
the world becoming ever more apparent to the growing mind, 
in the history of the race, in the whole of human destiny," 
not in isolated epochs of action or of faith, and in il the slow 
pressure of his own intuitive judgment which men call 
conscience," the boy must be led to search for and find the 
Divine. 

supply us with what we lack. The all-vivifying, all-forming power 
of child-life that we no longer posstss, let us receive again from them. 
Let us learn from our children ; let us live with them : so shall their 
lives bring peace and joy to us ; so shall we begin to be and to be- 
come wise " (Education of Man, Froebel, section 42). 
1 Science of Education, p. 162. 



CHAPTER III 

PRACTICAL PEDAGOGY 

Section I. — Theory of Instruction 

The formation ^^ a i m °f education, as before explained, is 
°the a^mo? chained for Herbart in the one word " morality." 
education. Its whole work is to form a character which, in the 
battle of life, shall stand unmoved, not through the strength of 
its external action, but on the firm and enduring foundation of 
its moral insight and enlightened will. " Since morality has 
its place singly and only in individual volition, founded on 
right insight, it follows of itself first and foremost, that the 
work of moral education is not to develop a certain external 
mode of action, but rather insight, together with proportionate 
volition in the pupil." x 

Herbart then claims the formation of will, which is synony- 
mous with formation of character, as the highest aim of educa- 
tion, to the attainment of which all its efforts must be directed. 
In the Science of Education, however, this the fundamental 
thought of the book is not treated of at first. It is merely 
stated as aim, and then Herbart passes on to consider the 
means by which it is to be attained, reserving any more 
detailed analysis of the direct formation of character itself, 
until the fourth chapter of the third book. He probably 
adopted this mode of arrangement, because he considered teachers 
required at the very beginning " a bird's-eye view of the means 
at their disposal." But he carefully guards his readers against 
being misled by it. As if to remind them that the aim was 
the one and all-important thing, and the value of the means 
consisted solely in their power to secure it, he asks those who 

1 Science of Education, p. 111. 



Practical Pedagogy 81 



have read the book from beginning to end to re-read it from 
end to beginning, when formation of character will have its 
true place of precedence. 

The sequence The means which education has at its disposal to 
£st!uctio™and secure this aim are, in the sequence given by 

discipline as Herbart, as follows: government, instruction, and 

means of » 07 

education, discipline. We shall, in accordance with Her- 
bart's expressed views, first examine his theory of instruction, 
and then, that their natures may be perceived more clearly 
through contrast with each other, consider government and 
discipline together. " For the same reason," says Herbart, 
" that in psychology presentations were treated of before desire 
and will, in pedagogy the theory of instruction must precede 
that of discipline." Just as presentations must first supply the 
material from which desire and will are formed, instruction 
must first supply the circle of thought upon and through which 
discipline is to act. This in no sense means, that discipline 
is not to become active till the work of instruction is finished. 
It must move by the side of instruction, guiding and helping 
the pupil to employ the contents of the circle of thought which 
instruction supplies, in the service of the moral ideas. 

Instruction. 

Educative ^ e nave seen that one of Herbart's fundamental 
instruction, principles is, " The worth of a man consists not in 
what he knows, but in how he wills." True to it, he considers 
knowledge and that which provides it — instruction — only as 
means to a clearly defined aim, the formation of a vigorous 
and enlightened will. Any other kind of instruction or know- 
ledge is comparatively valueless. " I do not," he says, " ac- 
knowledge any instruction which does not educate. Into what 
is learned for the sake of gain, or advancement, or amusement, 
the question does not enter, whether the pupil is better for it. 
Of such instruction I do not speak. I .treat only of educative 
instruction." 1 Educative instruction, an expression originated 
by Herbart, has been well defined as instruction that makes 
for character. 



Umriss pcldagogischer Vorlesunge?i, 57. 



82 T?itroductw?i to Herb art's Science and Practice of Education 



Experience and The child, when he passes into the teacher's hand, 
ttJKSgtt? nas already accumulated a vast store of ideas. In 
school raws ^ JS ear ^y y ears " ne g ets acquainted with the thou- 
sand things of home, street, garden, field, wood, the 
wonders of the heavens, the manifold events of nature, the land 
and people of the neighbourhood, and learns to call most of 
them by name; he learns to use a great part of the vocabulary 
of his mother- tongue and its most important forms of word an 1 
sentence ; he learns to think in the vernacular." 1 In a word, he 
looks at the world around him. In Herbart's language, he 
gathers experience. Again, from father and mother in their 
relation to himself and to each other, he learns the nature of 
home, and something of the meaning of love and duty. He 
comes in contact with brothers, sisters, and playmates, is happy 
or sad with them. He even extends these feelings to inanimate 
objects, believing they are living: he will comfort the sick doll, 
and pity the crushed flower. He feels with his little world. 
In Herbart's language, he has intercourse with human beings. 
" From nature," he says, " man attains to knowledge through 
experience, and to sympathy through intercourse." 2 

If experience and intercourse are thus actively 

store ortnought filling the child's mind, what work is left for the 
to be examined. ° xx . _ ' . 

teacher i His first step must be to examine the 

existing store of thoughts in the child. 

This is necessary, firstly, that he may gather together and 
arrange the knowledge the child already possesses in such a 
way, that it may be ready to assimilate and be assimilated 
with the new knowledge offered to him in instruction. The 
mental treasure the child takes to school — those vivid ideas 
acquired by repeated sense perceptions during the most impres- 
sionable years of his life — ought to stand in the closest, most 
vital relation to all his later culture. It must form the firm 
foundation of the new instruction and be built into its struc- 
ture, if the child's store of thought is to be, what Herbart 
requires it, interconnected in all its parts. Therefore what 
the teacher gives must be supplementing, never suppressive. 



1 On Apperception, Lange. * Science of Education, p. 186. 



Practical Pedagogy 8$ 

11 He has to reach doAvn with regulative hand into those quiet 
private thoughts and feelings of the child, in which lie his ego 
and his whole future, that they may rise above the threshold 
of consciousness, and communicate understanding, clearness, 
warmth, and life to instruction." 1 

It is necessary, secondly, in order that the teacher may learn 
where the existing store is defective, confused, or incomplete, so 
that he may by instruction explain, correct, and fill up wherever 
necessary. " As we know that the child on entering school has 
mastered a limited part of his surroundings, and that many of 
his home observations need clearing up and sifting, we lead 
him back into the old familiar world in which he has heretofore 
lived, and which is dear to him. We teach him to know it 
better, to make him more familiar with it, and thus develop 
knowledge of the home environment." 

Lange, in the same strikingly clear and attractive book, 
points out the incompleteness as well as the vitality of the 
knowledge the child already possesses. It is relatively rich 
in sense percepts, but one-sided, because it only covers a few 
fields. While there is a comparative wealth of such percepts, 
their very strength is a cause of imperfection, and often of 
superficiality. The child is so absorbed in one or two striking 
characteristics of an attractive object, that he has no attention 
left to observe the remainder. He thus obtains an incomplete 
picture of the whole. Herbart alludes to the general deficien- 
cies of this knowledge in these words : " The gaps left by inter- 
course in the little sphere of feeling, and those left by experience 
in the larger circle of knowledge, are for us almost equally great, 
and in the former, as in the latter, completion by instruction 
must be welcome." 2 

The child's ex- ^11 then that the child has already gained 
penence and J & 

intercourse through contact with nature, (in Herbart's lan- 
arranged and & . v . 

amplified, guage, the harvest oi experience) requires to be 

examined, arranged, and amplified by the teacher, that it may 
be used as the starting-point to a wider knowledge. All 
fellow-feeling already developed in the limited sphere of home, 

1 On Apperception, Lange, p. 106. 2 Science of Education, p. 136. 



84 Introduction to Herbart's Science and Practice of Education 

through contact with fellow-creatures — parents, brothers, 
sisters, friends (in Herbart's language, the gains of intercourse) 
— requires likewise the guiding, expanding aid of instruction, 
that it may be made the starting-point to a wider sympathy. 
In Herbart's words, "whenever a plan of instruction has to 
be made for any individual, there will always be found an 
existent circle of intercourse and experience, in which that 
individual is placed. This circle is capable of being judiciously 
widened, or its contents may be more thoroughly examined ; 
this is the first thing which requires attention." x 
Presentative At first this store must be used by the teacher 
lnS peSd3°on de " a3 tne basis °f wnat Herbart calls presentative in- 
apperception. s tr U ction — that which begins before the child can 
read, and which reaches him through directed observation, the 
teacher's descriptive skill, and pictures. Presentative instruc- 
tion can only be understood and appropriated — that is, apper- 
ceived — by the child under two conditions : first, that it is 
related to groups of ideas already existent in the child's mind ; 
second, that it is connected with and explained in the light of 
these older ideas by the teacher. We have seen that the 
experience and intercourse of the child's early years supply a 
wealth of such ideas. Both conditions then are fulfilled, if the 
teacher has the skill to call them up into consciousness and to 
connect the old with the new, so that the old can make the new, 
on the strength of their kinship, a vital part of themselves. 
This is expressed by Herbart thus : " From the horizon which 
bounds the eye, we can take measurements by which, through 
descriptions of the next-lying territory, that horizon can be 
enlarged. The child may be led back by the life thread of 
older persons surrounding it ; we can generally render per- 
ceptible to the senses through mere presentation everything 
sufficiently similar to and bound up with what the child till 
then has observed." 2 

Experieuce and But this fund of home observation is not to be 
used e thi°ougn- looked upon as exhausted in the first months at 
outinsuuction. school. Experience and intercourse are " the two 

1 Science of Education, p. 154. 2 Ibid., p. 137. 



Practical Pedagogy 85 



constant teachers of men." They are an essential factor as an 
aid to apperception in almost every subject of instruction, and 
ought to be made use of during the whole of school life. 
Herbart thus estimates their immense value to the teacher as 
continuous aids: "Who can dispense with experience and in- 
tercourse in education ? To do so would be to dispense with 
daylight and content ourselves with candle-light. Fulness, 
strength, individual definiteness in all our presentations, prac- 
tice in the application of the general, contact with the real, 
with the country and the age, patience with men as they are 
— all this must be derived from those original sources of 
mental life." x 

The two lines Starting from preservative instruction, educa- 
of instruction, tinrfr, according to Herbart, takes two main lines : (1) 
the historical, which includes history religious and profane, 
literature, languages, and art ; (2) the natural scientific, which 
includes geography, mathematics, and natural history, etc. In 
what way can these subjects be related to the material of 
experience and intercourse ? How can it be used in later in- 
struction ? Herbart's detailed answer to these questions will 
be found in his chapters on " The Course of Instruction," and 
only the following short extracts can be given here, as illus- 
trating his ideas concerning the early use of this material 
analytically and synthetically: — 

Analytic in- " The contemporaneous environment can be ana- 
stiuction. lyzed into separate things, the separate things into 
their component parts, and these last again, into their pro- 
perties. . . . From presentative instruction (which must be 
bound up with what the child has hitherto observed) geography 
and history will gradually develop." 2 " Intercourse can also be 
analyzed, and we can concentrate the mind on the particular 
feelings of sympathy which it supplies. ... A genuine under- 
standing of the feelings of others presupposes the comprehen- 
sion of one's own. Therefore we must analyze the youthful 
soul to itself ; it should discover in itself the type of the move- 
ments of the human mind." 3 

1 Science of Education, p. 137. 2 Ibid., p. 174. 3 Ibid., p. 173. 



86 Introduction to Herbart* s Science and Practice of Education 

synthetic in- " Synthetic instruction, which builds with its 
struction. own s t nes, is incomparably richer than the in- 
dividual environment of the child/' Nevertheless Herbart 
throws out hints 1 as to the manner in which that environment 
may be utilized in the earliest years, " so that the elements 
of synthesis, being early made constituent parts of the child's 
daily experience, may steal imperceptibly into the mind." 
Example of in- - For explanatory^ clear, and suggestive illustra- 

struction based tions of the manner in which, on Herbart's prin- 
on experience. . . . , . , , 

ciple, experience and intercourse may be used as 

powerful aids to apperception in every subject of instruction, 
the reader should consult Herr Lange's work. 2 As examples, 
especially relating to the extracts from Herbart just given, 
we take the following : — 

First, as to the material of experience in geography and 
history, " which develop from presentative instruction " : " The 
teacher should see that the pupil may obtain, upon the founda- 
tion of numerous observations at home, those indispensable 
geographical ideas of creek, river, tributary, source and mouth, 
island, peninsula, and isthmus, plateau and valley, watershed, 
mountain crest, and pass, etc. He should exercise him diligently 
in measuring and calculating stretches of road and areas. 
Thus he will gain in his local home experience, clear and 
distinct ideas of geographical measurements. These measure- 
ments should be closely related to the daily observations of 
the child — the extent of an acre, a mile or a square mile. He 
should at all times be able to relate to a neighbouring piece 
of ground or meadow, a certain section of the road, the division 
lines of his home district ; he should also become acquainted 
with the different soils of the home district, with its swampy, 
sandy, and barren tracts, so that he may have at hand definite 
appropriate images for the marshes, deserts, and plains of 
geography lessons; he should group and compare what he 
has by degrees observed concerning the changes of temperature, 

1 Science of Education, p. 159. 

2 There is an excellent translation of this book by the American 
Herbart Club, edited by Prof, de Garruo, from which the extracts given 
in this work are taken. 



Practical Pedagogy 87 



the position of the sun during the different seasons, the gains 
and losses of day and night, the apparent changes of the moon, 
and should sketch a map of the celestial bodies with which 
he has become familiar. Finally, this study will train the 
pupil — and this is not the least of its task — to draw an outline 
map not only of his residence town, but also of the entire 
home district as far as it is familiar to him, and so to live into 
an understanding of the map." 1 

These ideas of valleys, marshes, and forests, the direction 
of rivers, the height and position of hills, not as described in 
books, but as they actually exist before the child, should be 
used to make history living to him. With their help, he should 
understand why invading armies landed at certain spots, took 
a certain direction, and fought battles where they did, why 
settlements were made, and towns were built, and trade flou- 
rished in certain localities. For the necessary observations and 
concepts of historical instruction, what a wealth of material 
London and many other English towns offer! Starting from 
the mere names of London streets, with which a London child 
is or can be made familiar, a skilful teacher can help him to 
people them with the life of the past, and by descriptions!, 
pictures, and visits to the different spots can bring Roman, 
Saxon, Norman, and Elizabethan London in succession before 
him. The crowded Walbrook and Fleet Street become once 
more the little rivers falling into the Thames, and the three 
streams the eastern, western, and southern boundaries and 
protections of the first British settlement, a wild moor, now 
Moorfields, its northern boundary, and beyond, a vast forest 
stretching far away to the northward, the remains of which 
are to be seen at Epping. In some such way, a child may get 
an idea of the first settlements of our forefathers, and learn 
how from barren marsh and dense forest and clay-built huts, 
the city of five million people has grown. By a continuous 
course of such instruction, much of history may be learned, 
as it were, at first hand. It has been well said that geo- 
graphical and historical instruction which does not thus seek 



1 On Apjxrceptlon, Lange, p. 183. 



88 Introduction to Herbarfs Science and Practice of Education 

its best help in the home observation of the child, plays on 
a piano without strings. 

Example of Second, as illustrating what Herbart means 
basefoSinter- *>v the " analysis of intercourse," take the fol- 
course. lowing: — "The domestic experiences of the child, 
his intercourse with parents, brothers, sisters, and play- 
mates, his spiritual relation to God — these are the ideas from 
which the teacher must principally derive the starting-points 
or aids to apperception. There occurs, for example, in a Bible 
story the word 'gentle,' and he finds that all do not yet 
connect with this word a clear idea. Shall he now give a 
comprehensive definition ? No ; only from his own experience 
will it become clear to the pupil what * gentle ' is, as must 
all else which is to be in reality his own spiritual possession. 
The teacher reminds the pupil of a night when he suffered 
with a bad toothache, and his mother took him at last on her 
lap, and rocking and caressing him, comforted him thus : 
1 Now it will be better ; in the morning it will be all over.' 
This is a moment when the child forgets the school, but he 
never forgets the moment. Or if the teacher endeavours to 
-awaken the idea of sympathy, he will accomplish this in the 
surest manner when he reminds the pupils of experiences of 
their own, and brings before their minds vividly those occasions 
in which they rejoiced with the happy and wept with the 
weeping." 1 

The child's Third, as an application of Herbarfs principle 
'amSjSdt? that tne cl " ld 's mind must be analyzed to itself, 
itself. £ or j n ^ kg ought to discover the type of the 
movements of all human minds, take the following: — "For 
the understanding of the thought or emotions of historical 
characters, it is best to direct the child's attention to his 
own inner experiences, and allow him to linger in thought upon 
those moments when he was moved with anxiety and dread, 
or fear and repentance, when the voice of conscience lifted 
itself to punish, or the satisfaction arising from a kindly and 
effective deed rejoiced the heart. An occasional quiet return 



On Apperception, Lange. 



Practical Pedagogy 



into one's own inner world, such as history when taught with 
tact can cause, not only teaches us to understand better what 
passes in the souls of others, but leads gradually also to right 
self-knowledge, which is the first condition of self-control." 1 

instruction Instruction then must know and, as far as 
must suppie- possible, use the child's store of experience and 

ment experi- c 1 r 

ence and inter- intercourse m its own special work, which is to 
supplement and extend these original sources of 
mental life. For, as Herbart shows, whatever may be their 
value as aids to the teacher, " the kernel of our mental being 
cannot be cultivated with certain results by means of experi- 
ence and intercourse." 2 Firstly, experience is insufficient, 
because its results, however rich, exist without the teacher's 
regulative help as " a mass of dispersed and formless frag- 
ments," which are powerless to respond with any ordered or 
sustained thought to the requirements of the mind contain- 
ing them. Secondly, sympathy is insufficient because "it is 
not the spirit of intercourse," and therefore the child must 
learn it elsewhere. " Benevolence and love on one side are 
not at all sure of arousing similar feelings on the other. The 
moral reciprocity of intercourse is doubtful, unless kindness 
is exhibited to the child in such a way as to arouse a similar 
feeling in his own mind. This can be done by the teacher 
through his own personality, and through the worthiest cha- 
racters of humanity supplied by poets and next to them his- 
torians." 3 Thirdly, both are insufficient because they do not 
bring the child into contact with the ideal. It is instruction 
alone, which shows " that contrast between the actual and what 
ought to be, which is indispensable to action." 4 

Under the term "educative instruction " Herbart, 

Significance of , ' 

educative in- as we have seen, understood something essentially 
different from the usual meaning attached to the 
word " instruction," which is ordinarily looked upon as a means 
of imparting knowledge, but only as indirectly exercising an 
educative influence. In his system, instruction is not only an 
integral, but the most important part of education. For upon 

1 On Apperce/ tion, Lange, p. 75. 

* Science of Education, p. 140. 3 Ibid., p. 139. 4 Ibid., p. 138. 



90 Introduction to Heibarfs Science and Practice of Education 

it devolve the building up of the circle of thought and the 
welding together, as it were, of the material therein employed, 
which must be the preparation for any true formation of cha- 
racter — that is, for the formation of will. 

Hence Herbart estimates the educative value of instruction 
solely by the influence it exerts on the will, through the 
nature of the circle of thought it constructs. In this point he 
may be compared with Eroebel, who writes in the " Education 
of Man," " The principal aim, the principal point of reference 
in the guidance of the boy, in the instruction given to him, 
as well as in the school, is to raise volitional activity to a 
state of stability and so to vivify and form a clear, vigorous, 
firm, and enduring will." Not every instruction forms a circle 
of thought from which a vigorous will proceeds. Even if it 
imparts knowledge, if it gives a store of clear and animate ideas, 
they may lie dormant in the mind and hence generate no 
volition. This is the case when instruction has failed to arouse 
interest, and has thus missed its end. Interest is the keystone 
of Herbart's conception of instruction, which binds it into a 
firm and ordered whole. "The final aim of instruction," says 
Herbart, " is morality. But the nearer aim which instruction 
in particular must set before itself in order to reach the final 
one, is many-sidedness of interest." 1 

Nature of What is the nature of this interest which, in 

many-sided Herbart's meaning of the term, it is the aim. of 
interest. . . & ' . . 

instruction to arouse r In answering this question, 

the essential connection must be borne in mind, which he 
establishes between interest as the nearer, and formation of 
character as the final aim of instruction. By this touchstone 
any kind of interest which does not forward that final aim 
must be spurious. We shall find in applying it, that interest 
used as a means of instruction is spurious and must not be ap- 
pealed to, while interest which is used as the aim of instruction 
is truly educative. 

A teacher sometimes creates an interest in his subject with 
the object of making the child learn it easily and quickly. The 

1 Umriss jpadagoyischer Vorlesungen, 62. 



Practical Fedagogy 91 



aim of such teaching is to impress the material, and several 
means are used to secure it, among them the arousal of in- 
terest. 

Again, a teacher sometimes makes the aim of his teaching the 
arousal of interest, and the means he employs thereto, is men- 
tal assimilation : apperception. 

Receptive and I n tne fi rst instance the aim leaves the means to 
fntMe C st P con- ke employed undetermined. Any material which 

trasted. w {\\ ar0 use an interest that will secure the object 
of learning quickly and easily by heart may be used. In the 
second instance the aim determines the means, for it can be 
rightly secured in no other way. Both the material and 
method of instruction are defined. It must be material which 
is connected with the subject in such a manner, that the ideas 
given in instruction which are to be apperceived, are brought 
into connection with ideas already existent in consciousness 
which can apperceive them, so that mental assimilation — apper- 
ception — may take place, for only thus can interest, which is 
an end in itself, be aroused. Let us consider in an illustration 
the nature and effect of these two different kinds of interest. 

A child is very deficient in power of concentration and in- 
clined to be superficial. Hence her natural tendency is to dis- 
like arithmetic. But she is very fond of music, and has a good 
ear. In due course she has to learn the multiplication table 
and cognate rules. This may be done with either of two ob- 
jects: (1) to commit it to memory as easily and quickly as 
possible; (2) to learn it in such a way that it will discipline 
and help to correct her faults of character. According to the 
object, will be the kind of interest aroused. 

If the first be chosen, the mother in teaching this particular 
child will set the multiplication table, etc., to music. The 
material that will arouse interest, which is only a means to 
secure the object, is chosen, and whether that interest has any 
intrinsic connection with the subject in hand is hence left to 
chance. In this instance it has not ; the interest appealed to 
is not in numbers, but in music. But the object is secured : 
the child will learn the multiplication table easily and quickly. 

But if the second object be chosen, the mother in teaching this 



92 Introduction to Herbarfs Science and Practice of Education 

child will arouse her interest in numbers as numbers by means 
of numbers. For the interest will now be an end, and apper- 
ception 1 a necessary condition to it. Apperception, as we have 
seen, is the grasping of new ideas by the aid of similar present 
ones. 

True to this principle, the mother, when beginning arith- 
metic, will remember " the present similar ideas " of the child 
are concrete, not abstract. She knows the meaning of 2 apples, 

3 nuts, but not of 2 and 5 ; therefore through the former she 
must be taught to understand the latter. By a number of con- 
crete objects up to 10 apples, etc., she must learn to perceive 
numbers up to 10 as abstract — symbols which can be used to 
mark the amounts of any object or objects whatever. By add- 
ing these concrete numbers together and then subtracting them 
in all possible combinations, she will grasp the addition and 
subtraction of abstract numbers up to 10. At this stage, 
though she has only this limited knowledge of numbers, she 
will be capable of understanding the nature of the multiplica- 
tion table, i.e., that it is nothing more than a convenient way 
of recording something of what she has already learned — equal 
additions. She can see that 2 + 2 make 4, is precisely the 
same as 2 taken twice over, or 2 twos make 4, and so on through 
all the combinations. She will also see that saying, two added 
to two added to two make six, is the same as saying, three times 
two are six, but that the first takes much longer than the 
second, and hence one use of the multiplication table. Having 
learned that 2 times 2 are 4, she will easily see that if 4 apples 
are to be arranged in heaps each containing 2, there must be 2 
heaps. Having worked this through to 10 apples, the step 

4 + 2 = 2 is comparatively easy, and hence division by 2 up to 
10. The child can now apply the first four rules up to 10 in the 
solution of little problems, the terms of which are taken from 
objects she is familiar with. Working on these lines with the 
guidance of her teacher, she will be able gradually to make her 
whole multiplication table for herself. Any one who has taught 
arithmetic thus, knows the joyfully active interest which can 

1 For nature of apperception see p. 43. 



Practical Pedagogy 93 



be aroused even in a child naturally disinclined to it, how 

ready she is to apply what she knows, to set problems to the 

teacher, and finally to discover rules for herself. 

In this manner the second object is secured. For 
Apperceptive . d 

interest mflu- when once the interest appealed to has been made 

tionof active by apperception, it will be a powerful agent 
character. -^ correc ti n g the child's faults of character. The 
absolute truth of numbers can be used to prove to her ocularly, 
how the slightest inaccuracy on her part produces a wrong re- 
sult, and vice versd that, given the correctness of her calcula- 
tions, no other than the one right answer is possible. Sue is 
thus through the essence of numbers, as well as through the na- 
ture of their processes, encour <ged and led to that closeness and 
continuity of thought, to that habit of steadfast and accurate 
thinking, which will gradually overcome and replace her super- 
ficiality and want of concentration. She will probably take 
months to learn with the help of the second kind of interest 
what she would apparently have learned in weeks with the 
help of the first. Nevertheless it is the first — receptive inter- 
est — which Herbart rejects whenever possible, because its 
formative effect is at best very small ; it is the second — apper- 
ceptive interest — which he makes the nearer aim of his in- 
struction, because it must, when once aroused in instruction, 
make for character. 

The knowledge of numbers given by help of the first kind of 
interest is not, according to Herbart, educative. It may re- 
main always more or less dead and worthless ; it must do so 
until later teaching or the child's own experiences fill up the 
empty concepts. The knowledge received by help of the second 
kind of interest, directly tends to strengthen the will. For the 
pleasurable feeling which accompanies knowledge won by ap- 
perception again becomes active, when a new demand is made 
upon the child's mind by instruction. Accompanying the will 
on the previous occasion, it now directly encourages it to a new 
effort on behalf both of the apperceiving ideas and those to be 
apperceived. The will thus aided keeps the new perception, 
that which is to be apperceived, in consciousness; on the other 
hand, it chooses from the mind's existing contents and holds fast 



94 Introduction to Herbarfs Science and Practice of Education 

the apperceiving ideas, those which are related to the new, 
while it keeps at a distance all not related to it. Thus through 
interest, instruction forms will. 

Herbart's "Interest," then, as Herbart explains, "means in 
defiaiionof general that species of mental activity which in- 

interest. . 

struction must create, but which has no place in 
mere knowledge. For we conceive of the latter as a store which 
the man may entirely dispense with, and yet be no other than 
with it. He who, on the contrary, holds his knowledge firmly 
and seeks to extend it y is interested in it." 1 
Far-reaching As an illustration of this — the first characteristic 

interest. f true interest— let us take the following. King 
Alfred of England, when a child, listened with delight to his 
mother's reading of an old English poem, and his own wish to 
read became so strong that the illuminated manuscript con- 
taining the poem, being promised to the son who should first 
learn to do so, was won by him. The interest in literature thus 
aroused, lived and grew in him amidst all the vicissitudes of 
his stormy life, so that we are told, " Neither his legislation nor 
his wars have left such lasting traces on England, as the im- 
pulse he gave to its literature." 2 His was a far-reaching 
interest. With mastery of English came the desire to learn 
Latin, and, when in the intervals of peace this seemed possible, 
the will to do it, so that he was able by his translations from 
the Latin to share his culture with his people, and thus in one 
sense " created English literature." 3 A far-reaching interest 
thus is the source of both desire and will. This is the ground 
on which Herbart claims and maintains for interest its import- 
ant place in his system of education, 
immediate But interest, besides being far-reaching, must pos- 

mterest. sess three other qualities. It must be immediate] 
that is, it must be its own reward. " Alas," says Groethe, " for 
that kind of activity which makes us impatient for the end 
instead of rejoicing by the way ! " The activity of true interest 
must arise from pure, disinterested devotion to the subject in 



1 Science of Education, p 62. 2 Short History of the English People, 

Gre^n, p. 47. 3 Ibid., p. 48. 



Practical Pedagogy 95 



hand, not from the desire to gain a creditable school report or 
a good position in life. -For " if any material charm seizes the 
boy strongly, he will calculate, and then he is lost to pure 
morality." 1 The teacher therefore must carefully, avoid in 
instruction everything which furthers the growth of mediate, 
and hinders the rise of immediate interest. The ground for 
doing so leads us directly to the third essential quality of 
interest. 
Many-sided " Mediate interest," says Herbart, " tends, the 

interest, greater its extent to one-sidedness, if not to egoism. 
The egoist is interested in a thing only to the extent to which 
it is advantageous or disadvantageous to him. The one-sided 
man is akin to the egoist, even if so unconsciously, fo~ he con- 
nects everything with the narrow circle in which he lives and 
thinks." 

If literature had formed practically the whole of King 
Alfred's circle of thought, if his interest had been only far- 
reaching, the work demanded from him by his age as warrior 
and statesman would have been left uudone. He would have 
been a one-sided man. To avoid the danger of egoism, and to 
provide that breadth of culture which will enable a man to 
command circumstances in the way which may seem to him 
morally best, interest must be many-sided. 

" Interest," says Herbart, " arises from interesting objects ; 
many-sided interest originates in the wealth of these, and to 
create and develop it is the task of instruction." 2 In the 
process, the child's individuality is to be left as untouched as 
possible. " The projections, the strength of individuality, may 
remain so far as they do not spoil the character ; through 
thern the entire outline may take this or that form." 3 On the 
other hand, individuality must to some extent be changed by 
widened interest, it must approximate to a general form, " or 
it will not be amenable to the general obligatory moral law." 4 
The teacher must duly weigh and take into account both these 
claims of individuality and many-sidedness, for " the more in- 



1 JEsihetic Revelatu n of the World, p. 68. 

2 Science of Education, p. 120. 3 Ibid., p. 120. 4 Ibid., p. 121. 



g6 Introduction to HerbarVs Science and Practice of Education 

dividuality is blended with many-sidedness, the more easily will 
the character assert its sway over the individual." * 

"In the many-sidedness of interest, the child will find protec- 
tion in the future against the yoke of the desires and passions. 
It will arm him against fortune's changes, and will make life 
worth living, even when a cruel fate has robbed him of his 
dearest. It will guard him from all errors which spring from 
idleness, and will provide him with a new calling when the 
old has been closed to him. It will raise him to the level from 
which earthly possessions and the success of worldly efforts 
seem but accidents, which cannot touch the true self, for above 
them stands the moral character grand and free." 2 On the 
ground of its importance as a factor in education, Herbart 
made the quality of many-sidedness the basis of his following 
division of interest. 

Many-sided interest he divides into interest 
Divisions of . . e . , , , . . . £ 

many-sided arising from knowledge, and interest arising trom 

interest - sympathy. 

Interest arising from knowledge is of three kinds : — 
Empirical First, empirical interest, which grows from know- 
interest, ledge gained by experience and observation of mani- 
fold phenomena. This knowledge excites pleasure in the mind 
by the strength, change, and novelty of the impressions pro- 
duced ; and the desire to progress in it is the result of an em- 
pirical interest, 
speculative Second, speculative interest, aroused by the con- 
interest, sciousness of the mysterious and the obscure, excites 
a desire to pass from mere empirical observation to the investi- 
gation of the origin of, and causal relations between phenomena. 
Esthetic Third, ^esthetic interest is aroused neither by 

interest. phenomena nor their causes, but by " the approval 
which their harmony and adaptability to an end win from us." 3 
It is synonymous with interest in the naturally, artistically, or 
morally beautiful. 

1 The reader will find an account of the manner in which Herbart 
reconciles many-sided interest and individuality in Science of Education^ 
Translator's Introducu< n, p. 34. 

2 Grundriss der Pddayogik, Kern 12. 3 Kleine Schriften, Herbart. 



Practical Pedagogy 97 

illustrations These three classes of interest arising from know- 

arisiD?from ^ e( ^g e m ay be illustrated from biology. The various 

knowledge, characteristics of individual animals would appeal 

to empirical interest ; the theory of evolution of species by 

natural selection would appeal to speculative interest ; the 

adaptation of animals to their circumstances and mode of life 

(e.g., protective colouring) would appeal to aesthetic interest 

Sympathetic Interest arising from sympathy is also of three 

interest, hinds. First, sympathetic interest is personal, and 

springs from intercourse. It is aroused by the reproduction in 

the individual of the feelings of others in their varieties of joy 

and sorrow, pleasure and pain. 

Social Second, social interest. When to the former feel- 

interest, ^g are added a comprehension of the larger rela- 
tionships of society, and a participation in that which makes 
the weal or woe of the many, that general interest in the 
progress of humanity arises which Herbart calls social 
interest. 

Religious Third, religious interest is developed, when this 

interest, enlarged sympathy is directed to the history and 

destiny of the entire human race. When understanding and 

feeling become clear, that the guidance of humanity and the 

direction of the individual lot are alike withdrawn from human 

power, then the heart is filled with fear and hope. " Belief 

springs out of need," * and religious interest is awakened. 

niustrations These three classes of interest arising from sym- 

of interest p a thy may be illustrated from literature — George 

sympathy. Eliot's " Romola." Her protest to Tito against the 

sale of her father's library as a breach of trust, would appeal 

to sympathetic interest. " You talk of substantial good, Tito! 

Are faithfulness, and love, and sweet, grateful memories no 

good? Is it no good we should keep our silent promises, on 

which others build because they believed m our love and truth ? 

Is it no good that a just life should be justly honoured ? . . . 

I am thinking of my father, and of my love and sorrow for him, 

and of his just claims on us. It was a yearning of his heart, 

1 Science of Education, p. 135. 



98 Introduction to Her barfs Science and Practice of Education 

and therefore it is a yearning of mine." Savonarola's prayer 
to her to use her sorrow as the road to a wider sympathy, and 
to return to the suffeiing people of Florence, would appeal to 
social interest. " Your dead wisdom has left you without a 
heart for the neighbours among whom you dwell ; it has left 
you without a share in the Divine life which quenches the sense 
of suffering self in the ardours of an ever-growing love. You 
think nothing of the sorrow and the wrong that are within the 
walls of the city where you dwell ; you would leave your place 
empty, when it ought to be filled with your pity and your labour. 
If there is wickedness in the streets, your steps should shine 
with the light of purity ; if there is a cry of anguish, you my 
daughter, because you know the meaning of the cry, should be 
there to still it." Lastly, Romola's repudiation of the limits 
Savonarola sets to the all-embracing love of God, would appeal 
to religious interest. " Take care, father," said Romola, " lest 
your enemies have some reason, when they say that in your 
visions of what will further God's kingdom, you see only what 
will strengthen your own party." " And that is true ! " said 
Savonarola, with flashing eyes. " The cause of my party is the 
cause of God's kingdom." " I do not believe it," said Romola, 
her whole frame shaken with passionate repugnance. " God's 
kingdom is something wider, else let me stand outside it with 
the beings that I love." 

An illustration I n the cultivation of these six classes of interest, 
classes 81 ^ niany-sidedness is secured. How would they be 
interest, appealed to by an event in English history — for 
instance, the defeat of the Spanish Armada ? The contrast 
between the little fleet of England, supplied to a great extent 
by the devotion of her people, and the immense armament of 
Spain ; the characteristic pluck and daring of the conquering 
Englishmen — Hawkins, who had been the first to break into the 
charmed circle of the Indies, Erobisher, the hero of the North- 
west Passage, and Drake, who commanded the privateers — 
their devotion to their country and queen, as typical of the 
whole navy; the events of the encounter; a comparison be- 
tween the build of the Spanish and English ships, and the 
superiority of the latter ; the defeat of the so-called Invincible 



Practical Pedagogy 99 



Armada by Englishmen — all this is calculated to arouse empiri- 
cal interest. 

Inquiry into tjie cause of the enmity between England and 
Spain, and an attempt to measure the actual effect on Europe of 
the victory of England contrasted with the probable results 
had the Spaniards been victorious — this would arouse specula- 
tive interest. 

The Queen's courage, the wisdom and self-abnegation of her 
councillors, the bravery and enterprise of her soldiers and sailors, 
the loyalty and enthusiasm of her people, as descri bed, for in- 
stance, by Kingsley in Westiuard Ho, all working together for 
the end of England's freedom, would appeal to aesthetic interest. 

Again, the Queen placed in so difficult and dangerous a posi- 
tion, and yet so courageous, England's forces commanded by her 
in person, and her dauntless determination, declared in her ad- 
dress to them, to live and die if need be, with her people 1 ; her 
prayer to the Lord of battles; her thought of the fire-ships, and 
her command to Drake to send them into the midst of the 
Armada ; the ensuing panic, and the medal struck in its com- 
memoration, with a device of fire-ships scattering the Spanish 
fleet, and the words, "Dax foemina facti " — "It was done by 
a woman " — all this would appeal to, and arouse sympathetic 
interest. 

We are told by a Roman Catholic writer, whose testimony in 
favour of Protestant England we may presumably trust, that 
when the land was threatened by the Spanish invasion " all 
party feelings, all sectarian divisions and jealousies, were laid 
aside, for every bosom appeared overflowing with that generous 
and ennobling principle of exalted patriotism, which Burke has 
truly called ' the cheap defence of nations.' " 2 Social interest 

1 "I am come among you at this time resolved, in the midst of the 
heat of battle, to live and die amongst you all. JEtather than any dis- 
honour should grow by me, I myself will take up arms ; I mjseJf will 
he your general, judge, and rewarder of every one of your virtues in the 
field ; and I doubt not but by your obedience to my gent ral, by your con- 
cord in the camp, and your valour in the field, we shall shortly have 
a famous victory over these enemies of my God, of my kingdoms, and 
of my people " [Life of Queen Elizabeth, Mademoiselle Keralio). 

2 Lives of the Queens of England, Agues Strickland. 



ioo Introduction to Hcrbarfs Science and Practice of Education 

would be aroused in the reader by this passionate enthusiasm, 
which beat as one pulse in the English nation. 

After the defeat of the Armada, Elizabeth and her people 
went in joyful procession to St. Paul's to return thanks for Eng- 
land's victory. In the cathedral, hung with banners and other 
trophies taken from the Spaniards, the Queen, surrounded by 
her councillors and subjects, knelt in silent prayer, then heard 
the chanting of the Litany and the sermon from the Bishop of 
Salisbury on the words, ;c He blew with His winds, and they 
were scattered." " The great sea-fight had determined whether 
Popery and despotism, or Protestantism and freedom were 
the law which Grod had appointed for the half of Europe and 
the whole of future America." 1 This general national thanks- 
giving which followed it — ruler and people made one by a 
common danger and a common rescue, and perceiving through 
both " the traces of Providence in the slow, solemn, often 
apparently retrogressive, but yet ever-advancing progress of 
the world " 2 — all this would appeal to and arouse religious 
interest. 

Balanced To avoid one-sidedness, interest must not only be 
interest, many-sided ; unless the six classes of interest be 
equally cultivated, one-sidedness amidst many-sidedness may 
still take place. Herbart illustrates the manner in which this 
may be guarded against thus : " We find, for instance, that the 
pupil is more inclined from his environment to social, possibly 
to patriotic, interests than to sympathy with individuals, or that 
he is prompted to value matters of taste more than those of 
speculation, or vice versa ; in each case the fault is equally great. 
First, the mass on the side of the overweight must be analyzed, 
completed, arranged ; secondly, the balance must be restored, 
partly in connection with this, partly directly through instruc- 
tion." The teacher must never encourage one-sidedness. " By 
no means should the presence of incidental prominent tendencies 
in the years of cultivation be regarded as a sign, that they are 
to be further strengthened by education." 3 In Herbart's words, 



1 Westward Ho! Charles Kingsley. 2 Herbart's fourth letter to 
Herr von Steiger. 3 Science of Education, p. 142. 



Practical Pedagogy iof 



"many-sided, far-reaching, immediate interest must be also har- 
monious, proportioned, balanced." 

interest the Herbart may be said to be the first who assigned 
motive power , . , ... , ,, , , .. 

in education, to interest its true place as the greatest motive power 

in education. Many before him had indicated, and even tried 
to estimate, the force that interest might become under the 
guidance of a genuine teacher, but his was the first attempt to 
formulate a complete theory of interest. Quintilian, 1,700 
years before Herbart had written, " Studium discendi voluntate 
quae cogi non potest constat"; and Eollin, gathering up the tes- 
timony of this and a host of other witnesses, expressed the same 
truth 1,600 years later thus : " We should never lose sight of 
the grand principle that study depends on the will, and the will 
does not endure constraint." Herbart, in his theory of instruc- 
tion and in his practical work as teacher, recognized the truth 
of this principle, and took it as his guide. Many, however, 
among both his predecessors and successors have done so also ; 
therefore it cannot be the principle which marks him out as the 
originator of a new departure in education. For that which is 
distinctive of him we must look within the principle — to the 
answer he gave to the question it raises ; since study depends 
on the will, hoio is the will to be reached ? By the power of 
apperceptive interest, he replies. Through apperceptive interest 
Herbart, as we have seen, appeals directly to the will, and 
draws it without constraint, by the gentle attraction of assimi- 
lated knowledge, into the service of instruction. It is this, his 
interpretation of the principle, which may without exaggera- 
tion be called a great discovery, one which, as it becomes more 
widely known and understood, will tend to mould all true 
education in the future. Others have attempted, and still at- 
tempt, to stimulate the activity of the will by external deterrents 
and inducements : self-interest, emulation, fear of punishment, 
hope of reward, and love of praise. It remained for Herbart not 
only to recognize interest as the true psychologic instrument 
by which the work of education ought to be done, but to demon- 
strate in his analysis of it, the nature and efficacy of its opera- 
tions when guided by a true teaJier. As the natural force for 
the work of education, it carries with it no corresponding evil, 



102 



Introduclio7i to Herb art's Science and Practice of Education 



while by the use of other means, serious moral harm may and 
to some degree must be done to the pupil. Herbart, it is true, 
recognizes the love of approbation (not of praise) as a motive 
rightly active in the young ; but, since it is appealed to directly 
by discipline and only indirectly by instruction, any reference 
to it will come under the former division of education. 

" Interest," says Dr. R. Staude, " is the light with which 
Herbart has once for all illumined with the brightness of day 
the dark and mysterious ways of the art of teaching ; it is the 
magic word which alone gives instruction the power to call out 
the minds of the young and make them serve the master's aims; 
it is the long lever of education which, moved easily and gladly 
by the teacher, can alone bring the will of the young into the 
desired direction and activity." 
How is interest How then, is interest created? An exhaustive 

created? answer to this question is here impossible, and we 
must be content with a few indications. We have seen that 
when the union of new with older presentations takes place easily 
and surely, a feeling of satisfaction arises, which again produces 
a desire for a repetition of the inner activit} T , and a need for 
further occupation with the same object. " To the pleasurable 
feeling is easily added the effort, at a favourable opportunity to 
reproduce the product of the apperception, to supplement and 
deepen it, to unite it to other ideas, and so further to extend 
certain chains of thought. The summit or the sum of these 
states of mind we happily express by the word interest. For 
in reality, the feeling of self appears between the various stages 
of the process of apperception {inter esse) ; with one's whole 
soul does one contemplate the object of attention. If we regard 
the acquired knowledge as the objective side of apperception, 
interest must be regarded as its subjective side." * Interest, 
then, is essentially connected with apperception. To arouse 
interest two conditions are necessary : first, that the new shall 
find masses of apperceiving presentations existent in the mind, 
and second, that the process of apperception, the fusion of the 
new with the old, shall take place with ease and satisfy an 
inner need. 



On Apperception, Lange, p. 19. 



Practical Pedagogy 103 



To ensure these conditions, (1) the treatment of the material 
of instruction must be determined by psychological principles ; 
that is, the teacher's method must be based on the psychical 
process in the mind of the child : (2) the selection of the material 
of instruction must be determined by the child's capacity for 
comprehending it; that is, it must be suited to the particular 
stage of apperception he has arrived at. The treatment of the 
material of instruction is founded on the theory of the formal 
steps ; the selection of the material is determined by the theories 
of the concentration centres and the culture epochs. The theory 
of the formal steps is undoubtedly Herbart's ; the theories of 
the concentration centres and the culture epochs are, as will 
be seen, developments of his school, about which there is 
much diversity of opinion. They will now be considered in the 
next section in order. 



io4 Introduction to Her barf s Science a?id Practice of Education 



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CHAPTER III. (continued) 

PRACTICAL PEDAGOGY 

Section II.— Treatment of the Material op Instruction ; 
Theory of the Formal Steps 

The material of instruction is contained, says 
the material of Herbart, in the sciences. But the names of the 
sciences are not sufficient for the classification of 
the material. The cognate materials in the different branches 
must be brought out, and these Herbart classifies as symbols, 
forms, and things. Symbols — for instance languages — are only 
interesting as the media of description. In themselves they are 
wearisome, and therefore, he emphatically says, should be used 
at first only so far as they can be applied to the description of 
what interests. 1 Forms also, the single properties of things, 
selected and considered individually, are not immediately 
interesting, and therefore, must "always be kept in close 
contact with actuality " 2 — with the objects which supply them. 
Finally, things, works of nature and of art, arouse immediate 
interest. Since they are nothing else than " complications or 
complexions" 3 of properties taken out by abstraction, and con- 
sidered separately, we can proceed either from these single 
properties to the things in which they are combined, or from 
the things themselves, separating them into their properties. 

Accordingly the course of instruction is determined as analytic 
or synthetic. It is analytic when it is broken up and articu- 
lated, and at the same time corrected and completed ; it is 
synthetic when the elements are given,"" and afterwards com- 
bined. 

Theory of the The treatment of the material — i.e., the method — 
formal steps. £ j ns t ruc tion, is considered by Herbart in his chap- 

1 Science of Education, p. 150. 2 m^ p . 150. 3 Jhid,, p. 29. 

105 



106 Introduction to Herbarfs Science and Practice of Education 

ters entitled " Steps and Course of Instruction." The abstract 

conceptions therein contained have been reduced by Prof. Ziller, 

of Leipsic, to the theory of the formal steps, and still further 

simplified by Prof. Rein, of Jena, whose classification we shall 

here adopt and translate. These steps are founded on strictly 

psychologic principles. They are simply the division and 

development of every lesson the child receives, according to 

the psychical process which takes place in his mind. 

__ .. . The material of instruction for a given time 

Method units. . . ... 

must in the first instance be divided into small 

sections or method units, in Herbart's words, " a little group 
of objects." l These units must not be too large, or their 
retention will be difficult, nor too small, or the material will be 
insufficient. They must each contain one clear, general truth, 
which it is the aim of the lesson or series of lessons to exhibit. 
For it by no means follows that a method unit can be worked 
through in an hour's lesson. While that time is often sufficient 
for an arithmetic, a geometry, or a natural science unit, one of 
history, language, or geography will sometimes require several 
hours. When the method unit thus extends over several 
lessons, a subordinate or hour aim for each lesson must be set 
up. The teacher must, as a rule, supply the aim for the method 
unit. When subordinate aims are required — that is, when the 
method unit extends beyond an hour's lesson— the children can 
generally supply them, and should always be encouraged to do 
so. 

The aim of the This statement of the aim is to be made at the 
method unit. ^j nn ^ f ever y i e g g0fli It must be a question, 

or exercise, or fact of experience, having a concrete content. " It 
must never be permitted to take the form of a general idea 
or general opinion, for it is clear that the abstract cannot be given, 
that, on the contrary, it is to be gradually developed from a 
group of similar ideas." 2 And it must be related to the child's 
already existent store of ideas. These conditions being present, 
the statement of the aim has the following advantages: — (1) The 
teacher knows exactly what presentations he requires as apper- 

1 Science of Education, p. 151. 2 On Apperception, Lange, p. 206. 



Practical Pedagogy 107 



ceiving helps, and thus "is prevented and protected in advance 
from a vague roaming round in the field of the pupil's experi- 
ences." (2) The pupil is placed in a state of expectation, the most 
favourable condition of mind for the growth of interest. (3) The 
definite aim directly promotes apperception, for it encourages 
and helps the pupil to raise related ideas into consciousness, and 
thus develops independent mental activity. (4) It is a powerful 
incentive to willing. Cl The pupil must know from the begin- 
ning what is the matter at issue, if he is to use all his energy 
in learning, and he will so use it if he knows exactly what is to 
be attained. Without aim, no will." 1 

The five steps The statement of the aim introduces the five 
a Reinand° formal steps. They are so called because all 
Herbart. material of instruction, however various its con- 
tents, must be worked through in the form these steps pre- 
scribe. We give Rein's classification and Herbart's parallel 
terminology, which will be found in the Science of Education. 2 

The Five Formal Steps. 

Rein. Herbart and Ziller, 

Preparation (Vorbereitung) Analysis. 

Presentation (Darbietung) Synthesis. 

Association (Verknilpfung) Association. 

Recapitulation (Zusammenfassung) System. 

Application (Anwendung) Method. 

Analysis as used by Herbart and Ziller means nothing more 
than the analysis of the ideas already existent in the child's 
mind, which are related to the new material ; synthesis is the 
apperception of the new by the old. Together they produce 
what Herbart calls clearness of the particulars. Recapitu- 
lation is called by Herbart system, and application is method. 
The term " method " used in this connection by him must not be 
confused with that wider use of it in the expression "method of 
teaching," where it covers the whole of the formal steps. 
Herbart prescribes the use of the formal steps in these words : 

1 Das erste Schuljahr, Rein, Pickel, u. Scheller. 

2 Science of Education, p. 126. 



io8 Introduction to Herbarfs Science and Practice of Education 

"In every group of its objects i" (i.e., in every method unit), 
" instruction must care equally and in regular succession for 
clearness of every particular " (analysis and synthesis, or pre- 
paration and presentation), " for association of the manifold" 
(association), " for coherent ordering of what is associated " 
(recapitulation), " and for a certain practice in progression 
through this order " (application). 1 

In working through the five steps of a method unit, the pupil 
passes through two psychical processes, i.e., firstly, appercep- 
tion, which is completed when, by the first two steps — analysis, 
or preparation of the old, and synthesis, or presentation of the 
new — the old and new have been fused together ; secondly, 
abstraction, which is completed when, by the third step similar 
objects are compared and combined, and by the fourth step any 
general truths they contain are elicited. The fifth and final 
step directs the application of the acquired knowledge. The 
result of the two processes has been defined as the growth and 
condensation of concepts from percepts. 

t formal First formal step : preparation. — In the preceding 
step : prepara- chapter on psychology we have seen (1) that if 
presentations are to become an integral part of the 
mind, they must be apperceived ; (2) that this process can only 
take place between similar or related presentations. If then 
the new is to be assimilated by the pupil, we must ask, What 
presentations are there in his mind which are related to the new ? 
Before the new ones are offered to him, these old presentations — 
the apperceiving ones— must be brought up clearly into con- 
sciousness. To secure this the teacher must make sure (1) that 
they are sufficiently numerous, (2) sufficiently clear, (3) and are 
in the right order to apperceive the new. Generally they aie not 
so, and the teacher must arouse some, complete and make others 
clear, and arrange all in the order in which they will be 
required. As the farmer ploughs the soil before casting in the 
seed, so also must the teacher carefully dig over the mental 
field, before sowing in it the seed of new knowledge. To bring 
the mind into such a condition that the germs to be given in 

1 Science of Education, p. 144. 



Practical Pedagogy 109 



the lesson will become fruitful, is the work of preparation. 
Thus its character is at once determined : its function is not to 
offer anything new, but to analyze the child's circle of thought, 
and to cut out from it that part which will be required, reject- 
ing the rest as indifferent. Preparation may be divided into 
two parts, the first of which the teacher undertakes alone, the 
second with his pupils. First, before every lesson the teacher 
must ask himself, What do my pupils know of the subject in 
hand? and, What ought they to know if they are to understand 
it thoroughly ? Every teacher ought to be sufficiently ac- 
quainted with his pupds, to fairly estimate the extent of the 
kuowledge he can assume in them. This ought to determine 
the range and contents of the new. If he puts no such ques- 
tions to himself, he will assume too much, or choose a subject 
too difficult or too remote, or he will not make it sufficiently 
clear and intelligible. He must know what apperceiving ideas 
his pupils have, if he is to fill up the more or less empty ones, 
and arrange all in the order most advantageous to the grasp of 
the new. Second, after the aim has been stated, the teacher 
asks his pupils, " What do you already know about the subject 
of our lesson ? Tell me everything you can think of about it." 
First one scholar answers ; then the others improve and complete 
his answer. This they must be encouraged to do in their own 
natural unfettered way, even if their style be faulty, and the 
arrangement of their knowledge unsystematic. " We must allow 
the pupil to express himself in a free, unrestrained manner 
about the subjects of his experience, not avoiding even the most 
peculiarly related events, in order that a complete absorption in 
familiar ideas, those strongest aids to apperception, may precede 
the presentation of the related new ideas." Then, to make good 
the pupils' faults and omissions in these narrations, the whole 
is combined, arranged, and recapitulated. " The apperceiving 
ideas must frequently be collected and arranged. If we passed 
the material but once, and in the order in which it would 
occur by chance, many contradictions would remain unrecon- 
ciled, and many principal thoughts not seldom be lost in a mass 
of incidentals. A brief summing up, suitable to the contents of 
the ideas, and a separation of the essential from the unessential, 



no Introduction to Herbarfs Science and Practice of Education 

is therefore absolutely necessary, and not less so, sufficient 
repetition and impressing of that which as yet shows itself 
uncertain and wavering." All that relates to the new is thus 
brought clearly into consciousness ; it is ready to apperceive the 
new, and the preparation is completed. The more advanced the 
pupil, the better can he make this analytical preparation for 
himself without the teacher's aid. 

Many teachers use preparation incorrectly, firstly so when 
they make it an address, and introduce into it new pre- 
sentations which belong to the next stage. Then the degree 
of mental activity and interest, which is necessary to make 
instruction successful, is not reached. 

" From first to last that form of preparation in which the 
teacher alone takes part, which subjects the pupil to discourses 
by him, and which the pupil must silently follow, must be 
declared inadmissible." When the child is allowed an oppor- 
tunity of expressing his own vivid experiences, the most frozen- 
up mind thaws, the lesson appears interesting, and the teacher 
gains in the preparation a wellspring of expectant attention. 

Secondly, it is an error to introduce the known material into 
the next stage (presentation). The child is then expected to do 
two things at the same time : to remember the old and to unite 
the new with it ; thereby both processes are curtailed. The old 
material is not strong enough to grasp the new perfectly, and 
the new sinks below the threshold of consciousness. 

Thirdly, it is a yet worse error to call up the known presen- 
tations after the new. It is putting the cart before the horse, 
for the new, which found no points of adhesion, has already 
partially vanished, and the after-calling to mind of the known 
ideas is merely an attempt to make good a mistake which 
ought never to have been made. 

The next stage — the presentation of the new — is not success- 
ful unless the preparation has been rightly made, and a mental 
appetite created, so that the old presentations stand, as it were, 
ready to spring up, seize, and master the new. 1 

1 The student by frequently referring to a model lesson on the 
honey-be ', given at the end of this analysis of the formal steps, will 
easily follow their development. 



Practical Pedagogy in 



Second formal Second formal step : presentation. — " It consists in 
step: presen- either relating a story (to little children), reading a 
selection on an historical topic (to riper pupils), or 
in showing and carefully observing a natural object or a 
geometrical body, an exercise in arithmetic for the solution of 
a problem, a geographical subject exhibited upon the board or 
sought upon a map and described, an incident in natural science 
brought up and investigated." Presentation is mainly governed 
(1) by the law of successive clearness, and (2) by the law of the 
alternation of concentration and reflection. 1 
The law of ^e ^ aw °f successive clearness produces, in one 
successive word, order. A collection of books piled one on the 
other in confusion is, on account of the time spent 
in searching for what is wanted, practically useless for refer- 
ence purposes. In a well-ordered library, on the contrary, any 
book needed can be found almost in the dark. Just so ought 
the pupil to be able to find and grasp rapidly, instinctively, and 
without reflection, the presentations which the mind contains 
as they are required. Teaching produces such clearness in the 
mind when the presentations it supplies and uses are not heaped 
up anyhow, but are given in single, small sections. The 
parts and their sequence are determined, not by the teacher's 
caprice, but by the nature of the subject in hand. In the in- 
sect, for example, we consider — (1) the head ; (2) the thorax; (3) 
the posterior part of the body ; (4) the appendages of the body • 
in an historical subject — (1) its actual contents, time, place, 
persons, action ; (2) its psychological course of development ; (3) 
its moral aspects. When the teaching is thus ordered, the 
pupil clearly comprehends the individual parts. 
The law of the The law of the alternation of concentration and 
concentration reflection provides, not only that the pupil shall 
and reflection, know the individual parts, but shall grasp their con- 
nection and combination into a whole.- Let us suppose the 
subject of the lesson is divided into four parts. The teacher 
takes, to begin with, the first— the head of the bee, for example. 
Attention is fixed on that alone ; there is no reference whatever 

1 Science of Education, pp. 126 and 144. 



H2 Introduction to Herbarfs Science and Practice of Education 

to the remaining three parts. The pupil concentrates himself on 
it ; each property and peculiarity is exhibited or elicited, so that 
it is thoroughly examined and known. Every part is thus 
treated successively, till all are known as parts. These psychi- 
cal acts are called by Herbart concentrations. The function of 
concentration is to see single things distinctly. This can only 
be if, according to the law of successive clearness already 
noticed, " the several varied concentrations disintegrated by the 
teacher's care are presented one by one." 1 

But the pupil must not only know the parts of a lesson as 
parts : he must also know them in their connection with each 
other, that is, as a whole. In Herbart's words, " reflection must 
follow concentration." "Concentration puts the parts into the 
pupils' hands, but the mental links are missing." To restore 
these mental links between the just separated parts is the 
work of reflection. It consists in a connecting recapitulation 
of the parts, following the preliminary division of the whole into 
them. Since it by no means follows that knowledge of the 
parts necessitates knowledge also of their intrinsic connection, 
reflection is a most important act in presentation. The pupil 
must be able to repeat the whole in any and every variety of 
sequence ; not till then will he grasp its connection as well as 
the contents of its parts. The passage from part to part allows 
" those necessary pauses to be made which give opportunity for 
a review of the ground covered, and a moment of reflection to 
follow regularly a state of concentration on the subject. Let 
short, topical statements and key-words be placed on the black- 
board, which indicate the particular points on which attention 
must be fixed, and which assist in retaining the idea. Finally, 
the separate parts, each of which has been made prominent for 
the sake of clearness, must be united and combined into a unity 
in consciousness. " 2 

Mental w It is a universal requirement," says Herbart, 

respiration. « ^ a t concentration and reflection should alternate 

with each other ; together they constitute mental respiration. 3 

1 Science of Education, p. 126, 2 On Apperception, Lange, p. 214. 

8 Lehrbuch zur Psychologie, p. 213. 



Practical Pedagogy 113 



Concentration, above all, must precede reflection ; both must be 
kept as near as possible together. Instruction must follow the 
rule of giving equal weight, in every smallest possible group 
of its objects, to concentration and reflection. 1 It is the posses- 
sion of a rich reflection, and the completest power of reverting 
at will into every concentration, which makes a man many- 
sided." 2 Presentation closes with a recapitulation of the whole 
by a pupil, not in the form of answers to the teacher's questions, 
but as a connected reproduction by himself. Then his faults are 
corrected, and his omissions supplied by the rest of the class. 

As before observed, with the two steps of preparation and 
presentation, the first psj^chical process — viz., apperception — is 
completed. Both preparation and presentation — analysis and 
synthesis — must be perfect, otherwise the following steps are 
impossible. " There can be no system, no order, no relationship, 
without clearness in single things." 3 The third step is the 
first of the second psychical process : abstraction. 

Third Third formal step: association. — The pupil, having 

formal step: passed the two steps just considered, clearly knows 
association, r , -f . , . 

a single object', the honey-bee; a geometrical prin- 
ciple ; a poem ; an event in history. With this, however, the 
aim of teaching is but half reached ; only empirical, not specu- 
lative interest is satisfied by the knowledge of particulars. 
What is learned is, to begin with, an isolated fact or object, 
from which, however, the mind must learn to rise to the 
general, to those universal and necessary laws which in the 
transitions of phenomena remain always unchanged — for ex- 
ample, to the rules of grammar, the laws which govern the 
psychical and material world, the maxims of morality, the 
principles of art, in short, to concepts and causes. The uncul- 
tured mind is limited by single things and externals ; the cul- 
tured rises to concepts, and pierces to causes. The teacher must 
start the pupil on this road; hence he must never be satisfied 
with his comprehension, however clear, of single things, but 
must stimulate him to find the universal rule, the law, the cause, 
which governs a group of single things. These universals he 

1 Science of Education, p. 144. * Ibid., p. 124. s Hid., p. 127. 

T 



H4 Introduction to HerbarVs Science and Practice of Education 

must, as far as possible, discover himself, and do so in the third 
step : association. It regulates in three ways the formation 
of general concepts : (1) by comparison of things similar and 
related ; (2) by comparison of contrasts j (3) by changes of 
sequence. 

1. By comparison of things similar and related. The pupil, 
for example, has learned in previous lessons about the Alps, the 
Caucasus, the Himalayas, and the Cordilleras. In this third 
step we ask him what, notwithstanding their differences of situ- 
ation, all these mountain ranges have in common. All rise above 
the range of vegetation; all are covered with eternal snow and 
glaciers ; all are high ranges, being above 2,600 metres ; and are 
distinguished by these characteristics from the medium ranges, 
which do not possess them. Thus the pupil forms the concept 
of high range, and can also deduce the conclusion from it that 
Kilmandscharo, which is above 6,000 metres high, must have the 
characteristics of a high mountain, and thus must be covered with 
snow and glaciers, although beneath the tropical sun of Africa. 

2. By comparison of contrasts. For instance, the pupil has 
learned in the geography of England about the Northern, the 
Cambrian, and the Devonian ranges, and besides the European 
Alps. If he now compares the Cambrian range with the Alps, 
a number of differences appear which contain the character- 
istics of medium and high ranges, and thus from the compa- 
rison of contrasts both these concepts are formed. 

3. By variations of sequence. A child learns to count 1, 2, 
3, 10, 100, and if allowed only to do so thus, will imagine 
there is no other way. But he can work backwards— 100, 99, 
etc.— and again with 8, 16, 24, in short, in every variety of 
numerical sequence. Arithmetic is really nothing more than 
the working through of numerical series in every possible 
direction. But it is governed by fixed laws, and to make these 
clear to the pupil fin addition, subtraction, multiplication, and 
division) is the object of teaching arithmetic. Through the 
constantly varying series of numbers, the general concepts they 
contain (arithmetical rules) must be elicited. Eor instance, a 
child has six marbles, his schoolfellow nine. The latter has 
three more than the former (9 — 6 = 3). If I give two more to 



Practical Pedagogy 115 



each, the difference remains the same (11 — 8 = 3). From such 
examples a pupil will conclude a general truth : that if it be 
desirable to add equal sums to numbers whose difference we 
want to find, the accuracy of the answer will not be affected. 

Fourth formal step : recapitulation (for generaliza- 

step: tion and classification). — The course of teaching so 

recapitulation. £ ar ^ ^ ag gj ven ^e p U p^i t he subject matter from 

which concepts have been formed. But these concepts must 
not be left in a state of confusion in his mind. The fourth 
step must gradually arrange the acquired concepts in the 
series and groups which their nature necessitates, so that the 
pupil may gradually see them as an ordered whole. This 
systematic order is again the parallel to the well-arranged 
library, in which a book can be instantly found. Upon it de- 
pend the readiness of thought, the power to reach and apply 
.a rule readily and without hesitation. Hence this theoretical 
arrangement is the necessary preliminary to all practical 
application. It is, as it were, the vast mountain lake into 
which flow all the mountain springs and rivers, which are after- 
wards to be turned to the practical use of the towns beneath. 
As an example, we may take the system of grammar. A pupil 
translates a methodically arranged French, or Latin, or German 
piece. In doing so he learns the various forms of speech, the 
different cases of the declinations, the tenses of the conju- 
gations, the use of prepositions and conjunctions, for example, 
that when the meaning is " so that," " in order that," ut is 
employed in Latin with the conjunctive, but when the meaning 
is " when," " as," cum is used. Gradually everything which is 
connected is arranged together until the pupil ultimately sees 
in Latin the five declensions, the comparisons, the pronouns, 
the numerals, the regular and irregular conjugations, the 
syntax ; in short, when he leaves school, he has a clear know- 
ledge of the whole structure of the language. 

It is obvious that younger pupils cannot go far beyond the 
process of apperception. Their perceptions are neither suffi- 
ciently numerous nor complete, to be the basis of generaliza- 
tion ; therefore the process of abstraction as a whole is 
impossible to them. In their case, " the material of instruction 



n6 Introduction to Herbarfs Science and Practice of Educaiiofi 

ends with the acquisition of series and groups of ideas, as, for 
example, of the traits of an historical person, a series of dates, 
a group of grammatical forms, the description of a country, 
the drawing of mountains and river valleys ; and it must be 
reserved for later consideration to unite these results with 
others into a higher form of knowledge." 1 " The complete 
carrying out of the formal steps from the lowest to the highest 
class is only justified, when the notion of system is changed 
according to the need, that is, when we understand by the 
word at one time general notions and what is universally valid, 
at another only dispositions and material for the making of 
general notions." Herbart warns against a premature attempt 
to stimulate generalizing, and points out the sufficiency, if 
well worked through, of the two first steps — i.e., the process 
of apperception — for young pupils thus : " The union of the 
groups presupposes the perfect unity of each group. So long, 
therefore, as it is still possible for the last particular in the 
content of each group to fall apart from the rest, higher reflec- 
tion cannot be thought of. We must be contented in earlier 
years with not attempting to give what we call system in the 
higher sense, but must, on the other hand, so much the more 
create clearness in every group ; we must associate the groups 
the more sedulously and variously, and be careful that the 
approach to the all-embracing reflection is made equally from 
all sides." Herbart defines system as " the perfect order of a 
copious reflection." 2 

Fifth formal step : application. — A multitude of 

Fifth formal . , r rr . . , , . , 

step: concepts, even if systematically arranged, is or 

app ica ion. i -^lg uge j. Q a m j n( q wn i cn cannot use them as 

required by the needs of daily life. How to utilize practically 
the acquired concepts, rules, laws, etc., then, is the necessary 
and final step of teaching, viz., application. It may be taught 
in a variety of ways. " The series of ideas or concepts may be 
repeated forward or backward from different starting-points, 
and under different circumstances. The child may be re- 
quired to pass from the concept to the individual perceptions 

1 On Apjoerception, Large, p. 234. 2 /Science of Education, p. 127. 



Practical Pedagogy 117 



(deduction), and vice versa (induction). In the case of his- 
torical instruction, examples may be gathered from history or 
the child's life, which either conform or do not conform to a 
given maxim. In the various branches of language instruc- 
tion, examples may be sought that conform to some grammati- 
cal rule, and conversely the pupil may determine which rule 
governs a given form, etc. Written and spoken exercises con- 
form to the grammatical system which he has thus far at- 
tained. In mathematics and the natural sciences, the geometric, 
arithmetical, and physical formulas and laws may be applied 
in solving practical problems and tasks, or a physical apparatus 
may be drawn to conform to certain given conditions. In geo- 
graphy a general map may be sketched from memory, or commer- 
cial, physical, and political facts applied in imaginary cases." x 

It is this continuous application of newly acquired know- 
ledge to previously existent groups of ideas, and the power 
which grows from it of passing through these groups at will, 
which constitutes what Herbart terms an interconnected circle 
of thought. The characteristics which a circle of thought 
ought to possess, whose store of presentations has been ac- 
quired and ordered through the formal steps of instruction, are 
thus given by him : " In it everything must circulate easily and 
freely ; everything must be in its place, ready to be found and 
used at any moment ; nothing must lie in the way, and nothing, 
-like a heavy load, impede useful activity. Clearness, associa- 
tion, system, and method mast rule there." As the direct 
support of courage, without which volition is paralyzed, the 
effect of such a circle of thought on character is very great. 
" Courage, then, will be sustained by the certainty of the 
inner performance, and rightly so, for the external impediments 
which unexpectedly appear to the foresight of a careful intelli- 
gence can terrify him but little who knows that, with altered 
circumstances, he can at once evolve new plans." 2 

There are thus five formal steps which must be taken in the 
treatment of a method unit, though not necessarily in an hour's 
lesson, for as a rule a method unit requires for its treat- 

1 Outlines of Pedagogics, rrof. B,-in, translated by C. and T. van Liew. 

2 Science of Education, p. 213. 



ri8 Introduction to Herbarfs Science and Practice of Education 

ment more than one lesson. They are preparation, or Vor- 
bereitung (in Herbart's terminology, analysis); presentation, or 
Darstellung (synthesis) ; association, or Verknilpfung l (associa- 
tion); recapitulation, or Zusammenfassung (system); applica- 
tion, or Anwendung (method). 

"However strange the division of teaching 

Principle of tne .. , . . P . J . ? 

five formal according to the formal steps may appear, it is 

steps not new. ., . ,, , . , , . , 

nothing really new, but obtains in every good 

method of instruction. When based on empiricism alone, it 
is the result not of psychologic knowledge, but of tact gained 
by experience, which can produce no convincing proof of 
its necessity. Through this Herbart-Ziller system of instruc- 
tion that indefinite feeling is developed into a clear, defined, 
educational idea. Each single step in the psycho-synthetic 
building up of the system of education is given in detail and 
firmly based on psychologic laws. 2 " The formal steps give rule 
and order to the act of instruction, in accordance with univer- 
sally recognized laws of the human mind. For a thorough 
apperception of the material of instruction takes place, only 
when instruction proceeds from the internal or external obser- 
vation of the child, proceeds from this to abstract thought, in 
order finally to ensure the right application of the results of 
such thought in practical exercises. This methodical procedure, 
which the nature of the human mind prescribes for us, is also 
the method of the formal steps." 3 

A Lesson given according to the Five Formal Steps 4 

(age 13 to 14 years). 

The Honey -Bee (Apis mellifica L.). 

By Ferdinand Werneburg (Eisenach). 

Example of a Aim. — We shall learn to-day about the honey-bee. 

ing S to\ a hTfive~ First step : preparation. — Before we examine its 

formal steps, structure and manner of life more closely, tell me 

what you already know about it. 

1 Association, used both in Herbart's and Rein's terminology, see p. 
107, The Five Formal Steps. 

2 Fadagogischer Studien, Rein. 3 On Apperception, Lange, p. 238. 

4 This Jesson is translated from Dr. Schultze's Deutsche Frziehung, to 
which valuable work we are indebted for much material connected with 
the formal steps. 



Practical Pedagogy 119 



(A summary of what the children know follows, which is 
omitted here for want of space.) 

Second step : 'presentation of the new. 

(I only give the main heads (the concentrations), omitting 
the combinations (reflections) which follow them, and which are 
strengthened by looking at live bees and their productions, and 
by pictures, drawings, and microscopical specimens.) 

a. There are three kinds of bee : queen, workers, and drones. 
Their structure. 

b. The bee communit}' and their social life. 

c. The religious significance of bees among different nations. 

d. The countries, especially in Germany, where honey is now 
chiefly produced. 

Third step : association, or formation of concepts. 

a. Comparison of the working bee with the queen and the 
drone (1) in respect to their common, (2) to their diverse charac- 
teristics. 

b. What difference is there between the wing of the honey- 
bee and the wing of the cockchafer ? (A lesson on the latter 
had been previously given.) 

c. Comparison between these two insects in the structure 
of the mouth and its parts, and their mode of feeding. 

d. Comparison of their mode of development. 

Fourth step : recapitulation, or sj'stem (here the systematic 
summary of the acquired concepts). 

a. Summary (orally) of the chief characteristics of the honey- 
bee. 

b. The pupil writes in his natural history note-book, "The 
honey-bee belongs to the Hymenoptera ; its mouth organs are 
masticators and lickers ; its development takes place through 
metamorphosis. The product of the egg is a larva without 
feet, which becomes a puppa, which changes into a perfectly 
developed insect. Queens and workers possess a sting ; male 
bees (the drones) have no such weapon." 

Fifth step: appl ication of concepts. Oral or written answers 
to systematically arranged questions, such as the following : — 

a. What organs (1) for feeding, (2) for defence, does the bee 
possess ? 



120 Introduction to Herb art* s Science and Practice of Education 

b. With what organs does it produce (1) honey; (2) wax? 

c. What activity of the bee exhibits a kind of higher mental 
process ? 

d. How do you explain the meaning attached to the bee by 
all nations, especially the ancients? 

e. What countries of Europe (1) in ancient times produced, 

(2) in modern times chiefly produce, honey and wax? 

/. From what plants (1) in countries bordering on the Medi- 
terranean Sea, (2) in North Germany, do bees collect the largest 
amount of honey ? (The geographical distribution of the most 
important plants had been taught in the previous summer term.) 

g. Describe the twofold relation of the bee to flowering plants. 

How can we, in the light of what we have just said, explain 
the following poem of Goethe's (aesthetic interest)? — 

" In colours rare 

A flower-bell 
Had early bloomed 

In leafy dell ; 
Its sweets to sip 

Bee came to glade: 
Each for the other 

"Was surely made." 

h. What do you mean by saying, " He is as industrious as a 
bee "? (moral interest). 

i. Draw as seen under the microscope (1) an eye ; (2) a foot ; 

(3) the sting of the honey-bee. 

k. Draw the front view of a honeycomb, etc. (sesthetic 
interest). 

By this method of teaching, the pupil is raised above mere 
dogmatic, mechanical, parrot-like learning by rote, and is 
taught to think, to form clear concepts, and to apply them prac- 
tically. He understands what he has learned, and it can be 
utilized. Thus this method creates clearness of mind and 
strength of will. Without these, true morality and strength 
of character cannot exist. The method, then, is in closest con- 
nection with the moral aim of education ; both stand in closest 
connection ; the method works towards the aim, and the aim 
without the method is unattainable. 1 

1 Remarks bv Dr. Sclmhze. 



CHAPTER III. (continued). 

PRACTICAL PEDAGOGY. 

Section" III. — Selection of the Material of Instruction; 

The Dual Theory of the Concentration Centres and 

Historical Culture Epochs. 

The selection We have already seen that matter which is 
of material. b e y 0nc l children's power of comprehension finds too 
few apperceiving groups of presentations, and consequently 
excites no interest. Obviously then the choice of material must 
be determined by its adaptability to the apperceptive capacity 
of the child. 

The advocates of the culture epochs claim, that the principle 
underlying them (1) so determines the selection of the material 
that it must of necessity be adapted to each stage of the child's 
apperception ; (2) that the sequence and co-ordination of the 
material is ordered by it in such a manner, that a thorough and 
many-sided course of apperception is secured thereby. An 
examination of all that can be said in favour of and against the 
theory of the culture epochs, seems to indicate that the appli- 
cation of the principle may secure the second, but leaves the 
first practically undetermined. 

Instruction, we have seen, has to supplement experience and 
intercourse. From experience we obtain knowledge of the 
external world, nature; from intercourse our sentiments, our 
dispositions, towards our fellow-creatures. The Herbartian 
school, following its founder, who divided instruction into " two 
main lines, the one for understanding, the other for feeling and 
imagination," 1 has thus classified the materials of instruction : — 
To supplement experience, instruction uses science matter in 
the widest sense, which includes geography, natural science in 

1 Herbarc's fourth le ler to Herr von Steiger. 

±21 



122 Introduction to Herbarfs Science and Practice of Education 

the strict meaning of the word, and mathematics. To supple- 
ment intercourse, instruction uses historical-humanistic material, 
which includes matter for training the disposition : firstly, (a) 
religious history, (5) profane history, (c) literature ; secondly, 
art matter ; and thirdly, language matter. 1 As the worth of the 
man consists in his disposition, that which trains the disposition 
best — viz., humanistic subjects — it is urged, ought to take pre- 
cedence in the school curriculum. 

The principle The preliminary psychologic conditions of all pre- 
ofm a teriaia? stations which are to enter the circle of thought 
f0rm jSiier d by as interesting, is their similarity and relationship 
to already existing presentations, the latter's ex- 
pectation, as it were, of their arrival, in short the most careful 
consideration of the particular individuality and its constantly 
changing stages of apperception, to which the material must be 
adapted. The principle as set up by Ziller, the chief represen- 
tative of the Herbartian school, which is to determine and secure 
the selection of such material, is contained in the following : 
" The mental development of the child corresponds in general 
to the chief phases in the development of his people or of man- 
kind. The mind development of the child therefore cannot be 
better furthered than when he receives his mental nourishment 
from the general development of culture, as it is found in 
literature and history. Every pupil should accordingly pass 
successively through each of the chief epochs of the general 
mental development of mankind suitable to his stage of develop- 
ment. The material of instruction therefore should be drawn 
from the thought material of that stage of historical development 
in culture, which runs parallel with the present mental state of 
the pupil." Ziller's principle thus is, in Herbert Spencer's words, 
that " education should be a repetition of civilisation in little." 
In other words, every individual must go through each of the 
stages of development which the race itself has gone through ; 
therefore the best materials for the instruction of the individual 
are those which represent the main stages of the development 
of the human race. 2 The question whether this is really a 

1 See classification table, p. 104. 

2 This, and the idta of accurately graded instruction, is strictly in 



Practical Pedagogy 123 



principle upon which the selection and whole arrangement of 
the material of instruction can be based, or is only a suggestive 
analogy, opens up at once the contention between the advocates 
and opponents of the dual theory. Leaving it on one side for 
the piesmt, we shall give a brief account of the practical 
working out of the principle by its advocates. 

_ . . . In accordance with it, Ziller has selected eight 

The eight ' 7 

historical cui- stages called historical culture epochs, corresponding 
ture epochs. 1 . -. f ■, t -. - . 

to the eight years 01 the school course ironi six to 

fourteen years. They are — 

1. Epic fairy tales. 

2. Robinson Crusoe. 

3. History of the Patriarchs. 

4. Judges in Israel. 

5. Kings in Israel. 

6. Life of Christ. 

7. History of the Apostles. 

8. History of the Reformation. 

Humanistic ^ must be borne in mind that instruction is to 
and scientific serve the formation of character, and that this is only 

instruction . ' J 

must be con- assured, when a consolidated circle of thought inter- 
nected - 

connected in all its parts is created. The advocates 

of the culture epochs urge that, if this is to be done, two wholly 
independent and separated lines of instruction — viz., the human- 
istic and scientific — must not be carried on side by side, to form 
two separate circles of thought. They argue that to avoid this 
difficulty, nothing remains but to bring them into the closest 
relationship and connection, and consequently the one material 
must be more or less determined by the other. To humanistic 
instruction then, which, as forming the disposition, is to occupy 
the dominant position, scientific instruction must be joined, and 
the choice and sequence of the latter must in the main be 
determined by the former. 

agreement with Herbert Spencer : " The education of the child rcmst 
accord both in mode and arrangement with the education of mankind 
considered historically. In other words the genesis of knowledge in the 
ir; dividual must follow the same course as the genesis of knowledge in 
the race " {Education, p. 67). 



124 Introduction to Herbarfs Science and Practice of Education 



Humanistic Humanistic and science instruction are combined 
material to be under one term : "instruction in things" (Sachun- 

made the con- . _ .. ° v 

centration terricnt). In language teaching, things are named 
and described ; in arithmetic, the numbers of things 
are dealt with ; in drawing, things are represented. All these 
subjects, says Ziller, even including singing, must, if the unity 
of the circle of thought is to be maintained, be brought into 
unity with humanistic instruction. The latter, therefore, forms 
the central point of the whole system of education, and, as with 
Ziller the treatment of the material of the historical culture 
epochs is the basis of humanistic instruction, he makes it the 
concentration material for all education. 

Principles for Regarding this Ziller says, " For every grade of 
^Vconcentra^ instruction and for each class a section of thought 
tion material. com pl e te in itself, a section of humanistic material 
must be set up as the concentration centre ^ round which all lies 
peripherally, and from which the connecting threads start which, 
radiating on all sides continuously, unite and hold together the 
various parts of the child's circle of thought. Tn this way 
instruction ceases to be a loose aggregate of subjects, which 
otherwise is absolutely unavoidable." 

Ziller claims that the choice and sequence of the concentra- 
tion centres already given are so arranged, that they accord — 

(«) With the development and progressive culture of the 
child's mind, that is with the grades of apperception which 
must succeed each other therein according to psychologic laws. 

(b) With the development of the child as parallel to the 
development of the race. All the chief periods of race develop- 
ment important to our present state of culture we know through 
classical representations; on the contrary, " periods which no 
master has described, whose spirit no poet breathes, are of little 
value to education." 1 

Such material of classical representations Ziller gives in his 
culture epochs. It will be noticed that, although religious 
instruction is made the centre of education, the two first epochs 
do not consist of religious matter. Ziller and the modern Her- 

1 ^Esthetic Revelation of the World, p. 74. 



Practical Pedagogy 125 



bartian school have found that for little children in their two 
first school years, Bible history is too difficult. The countries 
and times, with their habits, laws, social forms, etc., are too far 
removed from the children for them to form any real picture of 
them. Therefore they consider Bible narratives can only exer- 
cise their true influence, if the ground is properly prepared for 
them during the first two years. 

Epic fairy tales The concentration material therefore, for the first 
as concentra- year is not taken from history religious or profane, 

tion material J • v ' * • 1 -i 

for the first nor from moral stories, but from stories about real 
or imaginary beings, i.e. from epic fairy tales. 
These best supply what a child needs. They are simple and 
yet full of imagination; they are morally cultivating, for they 
put situations or relationships before the child which call out 
the moral judgment either in approval or disapproval. They 
teach much, giving opportunities for conversation on nature and 
society ; they are of permanent value, for they invite a return 
to them, and make such an impression, that they become a source 
of many-sided interest. The advantages of this material as 
summed up by Ziller are as follows: The tales, being poetical, 
are better suited than anything else to the earliest stage of the 
child's individuality, when imagination, which needs cultivation 
because in it all higher aspirations are rooted, is strongest. 
They are not limited by time and space, for they are often 
without the names of persons or places. The child lives in 
them beyond the limits of the material, makes the dead living, 
puts a soul into the soulless, and has intercourse with the 
whole world as his equal. This has no bad influence on him, 
for the tales contain, beside their subjective view of things, a 
number of objective aesthetic and ethical ideas and principles 
consonant with reason. These serve specially to exercise the 
ethical judgment, as the tales open out a large field where many 
true and simple cases come before the child, upon which he can 
decide easily, quickly, and clearly. As he grows older, and his 
experience becomes richer, the real in the tales is less cared for, 
and more interest is taken in the poetical and ideal truth of the 
aesthetic and ethical, which thus remains as a residue much 
to be desired, giving an ideal direction to the thoughts, and a 



126 Introduction to Herbarfs Science and Practice of Education 

higher activity to the intellectual life. 1 If the child came in 
the tales in contact with nothing but actual realities, his mind 
would soon become open only to the commonest sensuous im- 
pressions, and would have neither sens'bility nor receptivity 
for poetry, nor for the wonder and reverence which is a part of 
religion. Again, all education must start from the individual, 
but with the aim of raising the pupil above his individualit}^ 
of correcting the tendency of imagination to centre in self, by 
placing him amidst general human relationships. " For the 
beginning of moral culture, weak and uncertain in itself, will be 
interfered with by everything that makes the individual self 
the point of reference for the world outside it." 2 This danger 
these tales tend to prevent. They widen out the child's con- 
sciousness from self to those about him, from the local to the 
national, and from the national to all mankind; they lead him 
into sympathy with that childlike spirit which was a character- 
istic of the childhood of the race ; they are a sure means of 
creating ethical judgment and religious feeling in the simplest 
relationships within the child's sphere of apperception. The 
modern Herbartian school — Ziller, Rein, Pickel, Staude, and 
others — have created a literature on this subject, to which we 
refer the reader who desires to study it further. 

"Robinson The concentration material for the second year 
Crusoe " as con- , i , , , •> i , . 

centration must be chosen on the one hand so as to continue 

material for the ,, , -, , . ., ,. ,-, . ,; -, " , 

second year, the awakened activity 01 the imagination, and yet 

on the other, by a definite relation to history, prepare to limit 

its unbounded activity, and lead the pupil to an apprehension 



1 Froebel constantly recognizes the same fact : that through material 
which appeals to the child's imagination, he may gradually be led most 
easily from the sensuous to the ideal. In the song of " The Joiner " the 
idea of contrast (between his long and short strokes) is further brought 
o «t in the picture attached to it of the Jong " giant Goliath, who plays 
such a laughably important role in the child-world, and dear little 
David, with whom children always sympathize so warmly." But both 
song and picture contain beyon 1 an ideal truth which through them 
the chi d will see. " The little picture wants to lead your child early 
to the idea that outer greatness by no means always implies inner 
gre unnss, and that the converse of this is true also " (Froebel's Mutter 
und Kose Lieder, No. 40, translated by Frances and Emily Lord). 

2 /Science of Education, p. 246. 



Practical Pedagogy 127 



of historical development. The new material must be such as 
can be used to spin farther the threads already fastened, which 
are to be woven into the material of a moral-religious character. 
This is found, says Ziller, in Defoe's Robinson Crusoe. 1 For, he 
urges, it takes the child back to those prehistoric times when 
man alone, without society, raised himself through want and 
difficulties above nature, to master and use it for his ends ; it 
takes him to those times, when the simplest and most necessary 
experiences were gained and things invented, the value of 
which we now through constant use hardly realize. Without 
that realization, however, the human mind could not have passed 
onward to those sociological ideas which were necessary to the 
development of its historic sense. If this point has been 
gained, the pupil's " chronological progress from the old to the 
new" 2 enjoined by Herbart is possible. In Ziller's culture 
epochs, that progress from the end of the second year, is from 
the earliest history of Palestine to the present day. 
Materials for The concentration material for the third year is 
Succeeding 1 ^e history °f tne Patriarchs, as the earliest repre- 
years. sentatives of human culture ; that for the fourth 
year is the heroes, the Judges, in Israel ; for the fifth year the 
kings, as representing an ordered state organism. For the 
sixth year, the life of Jesus, the view of life embodied in Him 
is an epoch in the general development of culture, which, 
according to Ziller, corresponds, or should correspond, to the 
child's development. The two last epochs (the history of the 
Apostles and of the Reformation) are considered necessary as 
showing the spread, the personal acquirement by, and embodi- 
ment of the Christian idea in the people, and they are also 

1 The educational value of Robinson Crusoe was thus estimated by 
Rousseau : " Since we must have books, there is one which to my mind 
furnishes the finest of treatises on education according to nature. My 
Emile shall read this book before any other ; it shall for a long time be 
his entire library, and shall always hold an honourable place. It shall 
be the text, on which all our discussions of natural science shall be only 
commentaries; it shall be a test for all we meet during our progress 
towaixl a ripened judgment, and so long as our taste is unspoiled 
we shall enjoy reading it. What wonderful book is this— - Aristotle ? 
Pliny? Buffon? No; it is Robinson Crusoe" (Rousseau's Emile, Book 
111.). 2 Science of Education, p. 181. 



128 Introduction to He/ barfs Science and Practice of Education 

of value for grounding the pupils further in the spirit of 

Christianity. 

_ „ , Parallel to the history of the Israelites, that of 

Parallel mate- . J , ' 

rial from Ger- the Germans is placed, and in such a way that each 

man history " , . , 

attached to corresponding epoch is entered upon contempo- 
raneously. The patriarchal times, for instance, are 
parallel with the Thuringian sagas, the Judges with the Sieg- 
fried sagas, and with the times of the kings in Israel, the 
times of the Kaisers in Germany (Karl the Great ; Barbarossa). 
Parallel with the life of Jesus is placed that of the great 
Reformer Luther, and with the first spread of Christianity 
that of the spread and consolidation of Protestantism. 

This material taken from great epochs is calculated to fill the 
pupil's mind worthily, and it will be enriched by a further 
series. Material connected with it from German literature 
will be added to the concentration material. Thus for German 
pupils, the time of Charles the Great will be introduced by the 
Rolands and Karl sagas. Many subjects must be selected 
from the realms of nature and art, which are necessary to the 
due understanding of the concentration material. Geography 
especially must be closely connected with it. The lives of the 
Patriarchs and of Jesus cannot be made living representations, 
unless instruction is given in the geography, natural history, 
climate, soil, of Palestine, its inhabitants, their habits and em- 
ployments. As already explained, the child's existent store of 
ideas and experiences must be connected with, and used to 
elucidate, wherever possible, the new material of the culture 
epochs. 

A grave objection, which will be considered later in more 
detail, to the dual theory, naturally suggests itself at this point. 
Its opponents contend that the connection between the concen- 
tration and other material cannot be maintained. This the 
adherents of the theory unhesitatingly deny. They, moreover, 
affirm that the subjects do not lose their essential characteristics, 
nor become mere appendages of the concentration material, be- 
cause connecting points only are made between the different 
branches. The material of each subject is treated by the 
method best suited to it, and a well-connected circle of thought 



Practical Pedagogy 129 



is created in the child's mind. That such a treatment is pos- 
sible, the Ziller practising school in Leipsic has, in Ufer's 
opinion, clearly proved. 1 

In Chapter III., section 5, the concentration and secondary 
material for a series of lessons in culture epoch 6 (age 11 to 12) 
is given, and, where necessary, English material is suggested in 
place of the German. 
General re- It is important for the reader to grasp clearly the 
^uai theory, dual theory described ia the foregoing pages, of 
the concentration centres and the historical culture grades as 
elaborated and formulated by Ziller and other modern Herbar- 
tians, and advocated at the present time by Prof. Rein, of Jena, 
by Ufer, and others. They propose to carry on the practical 
work of education by its aid, and to remodel the elementary 
school system thereon, while using the "formal steps," which 
are certainly Herbart's, as the psychologic working out of the 
process of apperception in the details of instruction. 

The dual Let it be clearly understood, however, that this 

Herbert's, dual theory is not Herbart's, nor was it originated 
by him. On the contrary, it has been developed since his death 
by his before-named followers. Some of the ideas lying at its 
root may indeed be found in the germ in his writings, but he 
must not be held responsible for it. 

As a tentative attempt to base instruction on the process of 
apperception agreeably to psychologic laws, and at the same 
time, as Voigt points out, to supply the real need of a right 
principle for the choice and ordering of the material of instruc- 
tion, this theory is most interesting, and practical attempts to 
work it out will claim the attention of teachers and those con- 
cerned in education. Its application to school work in Germany 
lias not yet gone beyond the stage of experiment. Time and 
experience only can demonstrate how much true psychologic 
value it possesses. Although Herbart's principles are quietly 

1 Ziller's Grundlegung zur Lehre vom erziehenden TJnterricht (1865) con- 
tains this theory, and Prof. .Rein, of Jena, Pickel and Scheller in 
Eisenach, have worked it out practically in their Theorie und Praxis 
des Volksschulunterrichis nach Herbartischen Grundsatzen, an epoch-mak- 
ing work in the history of education. Ziller's practising school in 
Leipsic is no longer in existence. 

K 



130 Introduction to Herbarfs Science and Practice of Education 

exercising an increasing influence on educational methods in 
Germany, this theory has at present only been worked out 
in the practising school at Jena under Prof. Hein, who is a 
lecturer at the university there. 

A curriculum To enable the reader to understand the practical 
dual theory, method proposed to be adopted in working it out, 
a curriculum and time-table based on it are given, which were 
submitted in November, 1893, by a committee of teachers, to the 
School Board of Wurzburg, for their approval and for adoption 
in the elementary schools of that city. One of the members of 
this committee writes to us that this plan, " based wholly," he 
says, " on Herbart-Ziller principles, may be considered as an 
additional stone in their system, and that the requirements 
formulated therein are grounded on the practical experience of 
its authors " (i.e., the committee). The curriculum and time- 
table, however, were as such not adopted by the Board, but 
many of the recommendations will be carried out. 
Difficulties in Referring the reader to the curriculum and time- 
the of' r tiie 1C8 table i n tne preceding pages, he will observe that 
dual theory, the historical culture grades, each with its concen- 
tration centre, represent the spinal column of the whole system. 
It may be imagined as the vertical line in the order of time, 
starting from the first school year and running upwards to 
the last, while the various subjects of instruction radiate hori- 
zontally ; these start from the concentration centres, and are 
thus to be connected with each other and the centre by the 
process of apperception, forming thereby, it is said, a " united 
circle of thought." 

In this plan the historical culture grades are contained in 
columns 1 and 2, and the religious historical material forming 
them dominates the other subjects, which are to be connected 
by apperception with the centre and with each other. * 

In teaching on this system, there are thus three continuous 
and separate lines to be followed : — 

1 It will be noticed that on the first attempt to carry out this theory 
practically its main principle — viz., one series of centres from which all 
shall starr, — broke down, and it was found necessary to adopt two series 
of historical grades, one religious and the other secular. 



Practical Pedagogy 131 



Firstly, the process of apperception must be carried on verti- 
cally from year to year in each subject ; secondly, the same 
process must be carried on horizontally through all the subjects 
in each year; and yet lastly, at the sam9 time, the due 
development of each subject year by year must also be 
provided for. 

For instance, arithmetic must begin in the first year with 
the very simplest exercises in the counting of 1 to 10, and gra- 
dually grow wider each year, till it includes decimal fractions, 
etc. ; and yet, while thus growing wider, the material of each 
lesson must be connected apperceptively in each year with the 
concentration centre of that year, and with all the other sub- 
jects, also growing wider of that year on the horizontal line. 
Each subject must grow pari passu with the others, and yet as 
each grows, the appercepting connecting links must be main- 
tained along the line horizontally from the centre to the ex- 
tremest point, and vertically with what has gone before and 
what comes after. 

Can subjects having no natural affinity be connected apper- 
ceptively ? and even if this be possible, can the connections be 
maintained as the lines extend vertically in years and growth, 
and horizontally in subjects branching out year by year, which 
become more technical and special as they grow ? Will not 
the connections become looser and more indefinite as the length 
of the lines from centre to subject, and subject to subject hori- 
zontally, and from year to year vertically, increases, till they are 
as good asJost altogether? This is the crux of the whole 
theory. If feasible, it stands ; if not, it breaks down altogether. 
We give at the close of Chapter III., section 4, a critique on 
this dual theory by Gr. Voigt, taken from a monograph by him 
on " The Importance of Herbart's Pedagogy for the Elementary 
School." 1 While adopting Herbart's principles in the main, he 
rejects this theory altogether. 

Dorpfeld, a great school authority in Germany, is certainly no 
upholder of the historical culture grades. He points out they 



1 Die Bedeutung der Herhartischen Pddagogik fiir die Tolksschule, G. 
Voi^t (H. Neumeister, Sohone beck , Prussia). 



132 Introduction to Herb art's Science and Practice of Education 

are not conceptually a part of the concentration principle, of 
which latter he would strive to secure the general adoption. 
He requires, firstty, each subject to form a united whole ; 
secondly, all subjects to be connected according to their 
nature ; thirdly, the central position of religious instruction in 
the service of the formation of character and culture of the dis- 
position. This leaves it open to form several concentration 
centres, around which the material of instruction may be 
grouped according to natural affinity. Voigt makes a similar 
suggestion at the close of his monograph just referred to. 

Religious Before leaving this part of our subject it may 

concentration be remarked in conclusion, that this theory would 
ouSedinthe seem to be the indirect outcome of the attempt 
Dan*s°ethSai ma( ^ e j an( ^ st ^l being made, by the modern Herbar- 
aim. tian school, to get Herbart's principles adapted 

to elementary education. The system of methodic units used 
in the treatment of the material of instruction, as adapted by 
the modern school is undoubtedly based on Herbart's educa- 
tional psychology. They claim that this dual theory is so also, 
but it may be doubted if such be the case, and even if so, it 
may be doubted still more whether Herbart would have 
worked it out in this form. Herbart himself, when teaching 
Herr von Steiger's boys in Switzerland, really used, though 
not ostensibly, Homer and the Greek writers as concentration 
centres. The great aim of the present Herbartian leaders is 
to get, as before stated, his principles carried out in the 
elementary school system of Germany. This ^would be a 
hopeless task without direct religious instruction. They 
have, therefore, elaborated this dual theory and made formal 
religious instruction the backbone of the whole system, by 
using religious material for the concentration centres in each 
historical culture grade except the two first, in the interest, 
it is said, " of the formation of character." The question may 
be asked, Would not Herbart himself have worked it out on 
purely ethical lines, using Greek history in the place of Jewish, 
and the history of Christ and Christianity in a simple, non- 
sectarian spirit? The principle lying at the root of the 
concentration centres may probably be found in the germ 



Pra:tical Pedagogy 133 



in Herbart, and has much to recommend it; but as to its 
working out and the material needed for it, much difference 
of opinion may, and does, come in. The Roman Catholic could, 
and certainly would, work the dual theory on Roman Catholic 
lines; Anglicans, Jews, Mahometans, would each use it to 
centralize his own religion, and each would adapt the history 
selected, for his own purpose and read into it his own meaning. 
This applicability of the dual theory to different and intrin- 
sically opposed educational aims would seem to indicate that 
there is psychologic truth in it, probably in the concentration 
centres. The difference between Herbart and the modern 
school becomes at once apparent by comparing their aims. The 
aim of education as defined by him is the formation of a moral 
character, as we have before shown ; that of the latter is also 
the formation of a moral character, but plus that of a sound 
Lutheran Christian. 

In a small treatise by Dr. Thrandorf on " The Treatment 
of Religious Instruction according to the Herbart-Ziller 
Method," 1 this is worked out, and carried to the point of 
preparing the pupil on leaving school for confirmation and 
entrance into the Lutheran Church. The whole course pro- 
posed in this treatise is of the most dogmatic, sectarian 
character. Herbart, although a deeply religious man him- 
self, practically excluded direct dogmatic religious teaching 
from the school aim, as belonging to the province of the home 
and the Church. For doing this and limiting the " aim " to 
the formation of a moral character, he had cogent reasons, 
reasons bound up with his whole theory of education. He 
desired that education should attain certitude in its aim, 
means, and results, and that a moral character should be 
formed which later on, when the work of the school was over, 
would withstand the storms of passion and temptations of life, 
ftased firmly as on a rock. For the means, he uses psychology. 
The aim — ethics — he bases also on what he considers an 
impregnable rock, viz., the intuitive judgments of the mind. 



1 Die Behandlung des Religions-Unterriclits nach Herbart- Zillersche 
Methode, Dr. Thrandorf (A. Beger and Sonne, Langensalza). 



134 Introduction to Herbarfs Science a,7id Practice of Education 

Nothing that can come in after-life can shake this ethical 
basis, and being interwoven with the whole circle of thought, 
the stability of the character is assured. But if in the place 
of this aim another, the formation of a specific Lutheran 
Christian or of a Roman Catholic, is placed, the centre of 
gravity is shifted from a rock to a weaker foundation. 1 For 
while different religions are based on different foundations all 
more or less laid in faith, foundations which in after-life may 
be, and constantly are, undermined by currents of new and 
wider knowledge and deeper insight, the purely moral aim 
rests secure on its own indestructible basis. To make then re- 
ligious material the matter of the concentration centres, which 
are the spinal column of the whole system, from which all 
starts and upon which all rests, would seem to be peculiarly 
dangerous. For if, when the pupil has arrived at intellectual 
maturity, and tests the grounds of all he has been taught, 
he finds them partly untenable, and must give up some, then 
the whole building of the circle of thought will be shaken to 
its centre, and the very foundations of his mind be torn up. 2 
For if even only some of the acquired religious principles have 
gone overboard, they, having formed part of the concentration 
centres, will in coming down dislocate other principles ac- 
quired at the same time through apperception, and will either 
bring them down too, or leave them without support. Any- 
way in such cases, the unity of the circle of thought upon 
which stability of character rests will be broken into, and 
the harmony thus disturbed will hardly ever be regained. 

These reasons would seem to be sufficient to account for 
Herbart's limitation of the aim of education to the formation 
of a moral character, one, however, he presupposes to be inter- 
woven with a simple faith in the fatherhood and love of God, in 
His ruling providence, and in the hope of immortality, whereby 
our relation to Him as children is realized. These simple 
truths lie at the basis of all religions, and to this extent 



1 These and the adherents of nearly all other religions base their 
ethics on religious dogmas. 

2 Such a catastrophe is vividly described in Robert Efomere. 



Practical Pedagogy 135 



Herbart would go, making an atmosphere of them in which 
the child should grow up. His idea of religion as bound up 
in the aim of education, and the manner in which it should 
be taught, can be gathered from that section of synthetic 
instruction entitled "Religion" in the Science of Education 
(pp. 179-187), to which we refer the reader. 



CHAPTER III. {continued) 

PRACTICAL PEDAGOGY 

Section IV. — Voigt's Criticism on the Dual Theory as 
applied to Instruction in Elementary Schools 

Voigt fully accepts the main principles of Herbart's pedagogy, 
and is of opinion that, if they are generally carried out, the 
elementary school system of Germany will be still further 
perfected and extended. Yet none the less can he approve 
of this new development, elaborated hie says, by some modern 
followers of Herbart, and which has found expression in the 
idea of this dual theory as applied to the work of instruction. 

This development starts from the idea, that the first aim of 
all education is to form the disposition (Gesinnung 1 ). For 
this purpose, suitable material is required. This material 
must be of a moral-religious nature, because the moral-religious 
relationships are of paramount influence in forming character 
and disposition. Its form must be historical, the individual 
being the basis of the general, and also because history, especi- 
ally religious history, is best adapted to awake the " whole of 
interest." 

Hence arises the necessity of finding a principle which shall 
determine the choice of the material, a necessity which suggests 
further the question, whether an objective principle at all can 
be found for this choice. Such a principle the advocates of 
this theory think they have found in the supposed fact that 
an agreement exists between the development the individual 
and the development the human race has gone through in their 
various successive stages. From this the conclusion is drawn, 

1 Gesinnung. The English language has no equivalent for this word. 
We use " disposition " as the nearest, but it must include all that gnrs to 
n ak • up the character of a man, both as to strength and nature, as to 
his opinions, feelings, and views of life. 

136 



Practical Pedagogy 137 



that for each development stage of the child, the needful 
material of instruction is to be found in the parallel develop- 
ment stage of the race ; consequently certain historical culture 
grades must be worked through in each school year, and the 
choice of the material will be determined accordingly. 

As to the actual building up of these grades, the choice of 
suitable material for them, and the epochs from which it should 
be taken, much difference of opinion exists amongst the advo- 
cates of the theory themselves. Voigt goes on to describe the 
material hitherto proposed to be used, which need not be re- 
peated here, as it agrees with the account already given in the 
preceding pages. 1 

Thus far only one side of this dual theory has been explained ; 
let us turn to the other. If, it is argued, the material to be 
used in forming the disposition is to acquire in the pupil's 
mind, that preponderating weight and clearness which is need- 
ful to secure permanently the unity of the disposition, the other 
subjects of instruction must not be taught independently of 
this material. On the contrary, it must be made the dominat- 
ing middle point (concentration centre) of the whole course of 
instruction, so that all the other subjects lie around it periphe- 
rally, and are subordinated to it in choice and treatment. They 
will rest on it, and be treated in connection with it, for only in 
this way (such is the view of the advocates of the theory) will 
instruction cease to be a mere aggregate of loose subjects. 
Only in this way can the central dominating position of the 
moral-religious ideas in the circle of thought be secured, and 
thereby the unity of the disposition be firmly established. 

W-hatever truth this dual theory may contain, it will be 
found to be untenable in the form proposed, whether, firstly, 
we consider the way in which right ideas of Herbart's have 
been theoretically developed, or, secondly, examine the grounds 
out of which they have grown, or, lastly, look at the manner in 
which they have been carried out in practical instruction. 

Three ideas of Herbart's are sought to be utilized in this 
theory. The first is, All instruction should work as a cultivat- 



1 S3e pp. 123-128. 



138 Introduction to Herbarfs Science and Practice of Education 

ing activity ; the second, All instruction should develop inter- 
est ; the third, All instruction should create connected masses 
of presentations. These three thoughts clearly dominate the 
whole conception. It is, however, equally clear that they are 
worked out, either in an exaggerated form or in a superficial 
manner, and for the following reasons : — 

"When Herbart says, All instruction should aim at forming 
the will, he does not mean that it should everywhere direct the 
will immediately on the good. On the contrary, he shows that 
the mediate formation of the will, which every good system of 
instruction serves, is the right and quite indispensable method. 
But the gist of the method implied in this theory lies in trying 
to direct the will immediately and constantly on the good, and 
demands for this purpose that the material specially suited 
thereto, should externally dominate the whole course of instruc- 
tion. This is carrying out in a strained and exaggerated 
manner, a right principle. 

Again, when it is said, All instruction should develop in- 
terest, it cannot possibly be intended that every method unit- 
wesson) should set the whole of interest in movement at once. 
All that can be required is, that each unit shall awake that 
interest which is cognate to the subject under treatment, and 
that thus in the due course of instruction the whole circle of 
interest will be cared for. It has been shown, too, that the 
interest attached to knowledge (Erkenntniss) is also of decisive 
importance in the formation of the will. What ground is there, 
then, for treating this class of material as of secondary rank 
in comparison with that attached to sympathy, or for trying 
quite unnecessarily to raise the former in a manner to its full 
value, by connecting it in a mere external way with the moral- 
religious material selected for the formation of the disposi- 
tion ? 

Lastly, even if the aim of instruction be to create connected 
masses of presentations, it cannot be intended that all presenta- 
tions created by instruction should form a single mass, which 
nevertheless would still be wanting in true inner connection. 
On the contrary, it is more in harmony with this principle of 
Herbart's, that several such centres or masses should be created, 



Practical Pedagogy 139 



provided only that connected groups of presentations grow 
around such centres. Voigt goes still farther, and maintains 
that, as Herbart distinguishes between different kinds of in- 
terest, dividing it into two main lines, 1 such a formation in 
groups is necessary, and he thinks that in this direction a new 
and valuable development of present educational methods for 
elementary schools can be made. 

Having thus shown that right ideas of Herbart have been 
misapplied in working out this dual theory, we shall again on 
examination find, that the grounds or presumptions out of 
which it has grown, are partly false and partly unproven. 

For is it not clearly an error to imagine that a mere external 
artificial concentration — and such only is possible when, for 
instance, instruction in arithmetic and natural history is 
tacked on subordinately to the moral-religious material — is it 
not an error to think that such a concentration possesses 
any value for the cultivation of the circle of thought, to say 
nothing of the formation of the will ? To connect what in its 
nature is related, is right, and of the highest importance, not 
only for intellectual training, but also for the general culture of 
the man. But when the attempt is made to forcibly connect 
what is not related, apperception does not take place; the op- 
posite of unity — namely, dispersion — ensues, even of that which 
in itself has true inward affinity. 

Again, the second presumption, and the one most closely 
bound up with Herbart's fundamental principles, from which 
this idea of the dual theory has sprung, is that the power with 
which the presentations act on the will depends only on their 
formal connection and on their being bound up in masses 
hanging together. This presumption is in two respects wrong : 
firstly, because the volitions are not a necessary result of the 
mechanical course of the presentations, and therefore they alone 
cannot be the determining power which pauses the movements 
of the will ; and, secondly, apart from the limits drawn by the 
freedom of the will, the preponderance of certain groups of 
presentations cannot determine the soul merely by their formal 

1 Viz., interest as growing out of knowledge and of sympathy. See 
Science of Education, p. 133. 



140 Introduction to Herbarfs Science and Practice of Educa ion 

order. As the soul is not a void, but primordially rich with 
living powers, the force or weight of the presentations is also 
determined by their nature or contents. The soul is originally 
predisposed to the good, the ideal, and it is this inborn affinity 
with the good, which gives the moral-religious presentations the 
possibility of rising to a certain power, quite as much as does 
the method of their preparation and connection. If this be the 
case, then, it cannot possibly be a right method of teaching for 
the teacher to be constantly impressing these (moral- religious) 
ideas on the child ; only when he does so, he must do it with 
clearness, authority, and emphasis. 

Our objections so far have been directed against the idea of 
the concentration centres, but they have practically touched that 
of the historical culture grades as well. For both ideas stand in 
such relationship that the concentration idea can be accepted 
independently, as it says in itself nothing regarding the nature 
of the presumed centres. The idea of the historical culture 
grades, on the other hand, loses its importance unless it stands 
in connection with the concentration centres. But notwith- 
standing this, our objections are not exhausted till we have 
examined the principle of the historical culture grades by itself, 
and its claims on our approval. 

The philosophical ground on which this theory rests— viz., that 
there is a law of parallelism between the development of the in- 
dividual and that of the race — is a pleasing idea ; but, carefully 
looked at, it turns out to be nothing but an unproved assertion. 
On this ground alone, it is unsuited to fix the normal course of 
instruction. It will further be found to be false when it is 
remembered that this parallelism, if such exist, applies to the 
whole of a human lifetime, while it is here applied to the mere 
limits of childhood, and to the course of a few school years only. 
This alone is fatal to the application of the idea to educational 
purposes. In what possible sense can it be said that a child in 
the limits of his individual school-life can go through the de- 
velopment stages of the human race ? Whatever can be brought 
forward in support of this idea, it is in any case inconsequent 
to limit its application to the years of childhood, and with this 
all grounds in its favour are destroyed. 



Practical Pedagogy 141 



In addition to this, there are other serious objections against 
the idea itself, objections which, in whatever way it may be 
practically carried out in the school, must necessarily cause its 
rejection. 

Firstly, it is maintained that a child should historically go 
through — i.e., live into — the various epochs of human develop- 
ment and culture. Is it not then a strange inconsistency, when 
tracing before the child the religious development of the race, 
to begin with the monotheistic stage of the Old Testament? 
Ought not a beginning to be made with earlier, more imperfect 
forms, which find expression in the heathen conceptions of the 
universe, in shapes from the rudest and most primordial to the 
noblest and purest? It is besides totally insufficient to use the 
Israelite race only, as transmitters historically of the development 
of culture, for in regard to art and science they accomplished 
so little, and are not to be compared with the Greeks. If this 
idea, then, is to be seriously carried out, a compendious history 
of religions, besides the Old Testament grade referred to, must 
be worked out, and with it at least the development of the 
Greeks. But as this is a work from which the boldest educa- 
tional idealist would shrink, it is quite clear that for elementary 
schools at any rate the idea is impracticable. 

We are led to the same decided rejection when we consider 
historical culture development, not in its extension, but in re- 
gard to its matter and contents. The development of human 
culture is presented in external history only in an attenuated 
form, for it has been determined mainly by the progressive 
culture of the mind, realized in religion, philosophy, science, 
and art. These, however, are matters which lie almost totally 
beyond the comprehension of school-children, and must remain 
so. 

The impossibility, therefore, is thus clearly to be seen of 
adapting this idea for the purposes of elementary education 
with any truth or success whatever. 

Such an adaptation would, in addition, be entirely opposed to 
one of the most important of Herbart's principles. 1 It is a pure 

1 Yoigt s ;ems here to overlook Herbart's repeatedly expressed thought 
that the subject matter bist suited to a boy's psychologic state of de- 



142 Introduction to Herbarfs Science and Practice of Education 

fiction, totally incompatible with the power and importance of 
the process of apperception, to imagine that a child of the 
present stands inwardly nearer to the time of the infancy of the 
race, than he does to the relationships of his own time. In con- 
sequence of the given apperceiving presentations which are 
constantly moulding the life of the child, that life is rooted in 
the present, and for the purposes of this theory, must be trans- 
ferred thence into the strange relationships of a distant past. 
The German empire is to the German child a clear presentation 
full of apperceiving power; his idea of the patriarchal social 
constitution, on the contrary, is in comparison a misty concep- 
tion. Modern life, with its railways, telegraphs, steamers, and 
factories, presents itself clearly before his eyes ; the imperfect 
social life of primitive stages of culture, passed over long ago, 
is, on the contrary, quite strange to him. How then can it be 
maintained with any degree of reason that an elementary school 
child should go through the whole series of the development 
grades of human culture, in order at the end to come out at 
the present ? 

Do not let us deceive ourselves. This idea of the parallelism 
of general and individual development is a theoretical idea, 
which belongs to historical science, and that only. It is a 
mistake to build the work of education, which has to serve 
practical ends, upon such an unproven, misty conception. Life 
only vivifies in contact with life ; but the life of the child is in 
the present, which bears within itself the main products of all 
past culture. It is therefore sufficient to offer the child the 
most valuable results of the long past both in the spheres of 
religion and of secular knowledge, and give so much of past 
history as is needful for a sympathetic understanding of the 
present. 

It remains now only to show that the combination of both 
these ideas is impracticable. A detailed proof, however, is 

velopment is to be found in the history of the childhood of the Greek 
race, and not in his own times. This thought is clearly givKn in his 
introduction to the Science of Education (p. 89). Had he considered such 
subject matter unsuitable for apperception, he ■would not have enjoined 
" a chronological progress from the old to the new " {Science of Educa- 
tion, p. 181). 



Practical Pedagogy 143 



superfluous ; all that is needed is to point to the various at- 
tempts made to carry them out. Such attempts are inevitably 
doomed to failure, as in their practical working out the band 
which should tie the individual subjects together (appercp.p- 
tively) becomes looser with every additional step outwards 
from the concentration centre. To the moral-religious material 
forming the concentration centres, a second — viz., the national — 
is added during the course ; and thus the ground idea of the 
whole theory, which demands absolute external unity, is wholly 
given up, and a series of dual centres is created. The con- 
nection of the individual subjects with one or other of these two 
centres, grows gradually looser the longer the chain becomes, till 
at last it is dropped altogether, and no attempt is made to keep 
even the two centres in real relation to each other. We can 
thus say that, so far as present experience reaches, the idea of 
the historical culture grades and concentration centres has not 
yet been shown to be capable of practical realization. 

While thus rejeoting this dual theory, Voigt points out that it 
has arisen from a real need, viz., to find out a true and thorough- 
going principle for the choice and ordering of the material of 
instruction. Although it has not proved equal to solving this 
problem, the future satisfactory progress of the elementary 
schools will depend on the way in which this question is dealt 
with. It will also depend on whether the dangers bound up 
with the dispersion of the circle of thought which results from 
present methods of instruction can be warded off, dangers which 
must necessarily increase with the increase of knowledge and 
of subjects. 

This theory contains, as before stated, three aims: first, that 
connected masses of presentations be created ; second, that the 
material of instruction be grouped round a central point ; and 
third, that the central moral-religious material be made to fol- 
low the course of the cultural development of the race. The 
two last of these are rejected as untenable, but the first deserves 
serious consideration. Voigt then goes on to show in detail how 
present methods of instruction directly tend to hinder the 
growth of interconnected masses of presentations. The text- 
books in use, too, have the same influence. A concentration 



144 Introduction to Herbart's Science and Practice of Education 

therefore of the material of instruction is a great need ; but to 
concentrate all under one centre has already been shown to be 
impossible, especially to make historical material this centre. 
He therefore suggests the question whether, as the interest 
to be awakened by instruction follows two main lines, it is 
not desirable to divide the material into two main groups, 
according as it relates to the interests of knowledge or of 
sympathy. Then by their side the higher and manual arts 
would form a third group, aiming at developing the creative 
powers of the individual, as well as awakening aesthetic in- 
terest. These groups would be carried along parallel lines 
through the whole school course, each independently in the 
way its own nature requires. But in each individual group, 
for each grade of instruction, only one province interconnected 
in itself would be treated, so that the group would gradually 
be built up out of the sum of these units. It certainly, for 
instance, would be incomparably better to teach the pupil 
national history daily in one year instead of twice a week in 
six years. In this way then the requirement would be satisfied 
which lies at the root of this dual theory, while the faults 
attaching to it would be avoided. 

The reader desirous of pursuing this subject further is 
referred to Prof. Rein's work Outlines of Pedagogics, 1 where 
he will find a full explanation of the theory and all that can 
be said in its favour. Prof. Pein is its most enthusiastic ex- 
ponent in Germany. On the other hand, he is strongly re- 
commended to study Lange's careful and judicial examination 
of the subject in his work before referred to on appercep- 
tion. 2 In the section on " The Choice and Arrangement of 
the Material of Instruction " he submits this theory to a psy- 
chologic analysis, and shows therein that it is untenable, al- 
though containing some germs of truth. 

1 Pp. 93- 135. Translated by C. C. and Ida van Liew (Swan Sonnen- 
schein & Co.). 

2 Apperception : a Monograph on Psychology and Pedagogy (Heath & 
Co.), pp. 109-150. 



CHAPTER in. {continued) 

PRACTICAL PEDAGOGY 

Section V. — Examples of Lessons Based on the Theory op 
the Concentration Centres and Historical Culture 
Epochs 

We have seen that, by the dual theory, education of the 
disposition (Gesinnitngsunterricht) or, as Herbart calls it, 
education of the heart, must occupy the central place in the 
plan of instruction. For each school year, the material chosen 
must illustrate the development of the race, and as such, it is 
alleged, must necessarily be parallel with the development of the 
individual, i.e. with his power of apperception. 

Religious matter for the sixth school year, (for pupils eleven 
to twelve years old) is the life of Jesus. Parallel to it are the 
voyages of discovery, and (suggested for an English table as a 
substitute for the life of Luther in the German) the life of 
Wiclif, the great English Reformer. 

Between the life of Jesus and the life of Wiclif there are 
many points of connection. Those which can be made between 
the life of Jesus and the voyages of discovery are fewer ; i.e., 
Christ broke through the Jewish tribal limitation of the 
kingdom, of Cod to the nation ; the heathen throughout the 
world were to have their share of heaven. The voyages of 
discovery point " to the people still sitting in darkness." The 
sending out of the disciples suggests the missions of Christian 
nations to the heathen, and with that, the contrast between the 
self-sacrificing love of Christ, and the self-seeking of those who 
taught in His name. 

The following subjects Ufer has, in accordance with the dual 
theory, treated as described. Where necessary, however, the 
material in use in German schools has been exchanged by the 
authors for such as could be used in England. x 

1 See Rein's Classification of Educative Instruction, p. 104. 
145 , . 



146 Introduction to Herbarfs Science and Practice of Education 

English. 

a. Material for reading : The Evangelists : Dr. Geikie's Life of 

Christ ; Washington Irving's Life of Columbus ; Cabot's 
Voyages ; Kingsley's Westward Ho ! Longman's Life of 
Wiclif; Chaucer's Prologue ; Pauli's Pictures of Old 
England; Palgrave's The Merchant and the Friar. 

b. Poetry (love as the soul of Christ and of Christianity) : " The 

Vision of Sir Launfal," by Russell Lowell ; " The Legend 
of St. Christopher," by Lewis Morris; " Building of the 
Ship," by Longfellow ; " Columbus," by Russell Lowell, 

leading to 
England's settlement of religious liberty beyond the seas. 
Connected poems are " Bermuda," by Andrew Marvel, 
Moravian Missions from James Montgomery's poem " The 
West Indies," this again 

leading to 
England's mission of civilization, in connection with 
"Slavery," from Cowper's Task; "Stanzas to Freedom," 
by Russell Lowell ; " Freedom," by Tennyson. 

In connection with the Spaniards' intercourse with the 
Indians, extracts from Longfellow's "Hiawatha" may be 
read. Columbus sailed the sea, description of which, its 
bottom, inhabitants, etc., are treated under other heads. 
But with this may be here connected " The Sailor's 
Grave " ; Byron's " Hymn to the Ocean " (Childe Harold, 
Canto 4) ; " The Treasures of the Deep " (Mrs. Hemans) ; 
Clarence's dream (Shakespeare, Richard III., Act I., Scene 
4); Psalm cvii. 23-30, beginning "They that go down to 
the sea in ships." 

As a picture of Wiclif, " the poure persone of a toun," Pro- 
logue ; Chaucer's Canterbury Tales. 

c. English composition : — 

1. A short prose narration of the legend of St. Christopher. 

2. Description of Drake's ship the Pelican. 

3. When the reading of " Columbus " is finished, the pupils 
must sketch the outlines of the hero's character on 
definite lines: industry, perseverance, trust in God, cour- 
age ; some or all of such to be worked into compositions. 



Practical Pedagogy 147 



4. Further material for composition will be obtained from 
geography and natural science. 

d. The corrections in composition supply material for instruc- 

tion in grammar ; errors in punctuation, for instance, 
suggest treatment of the simpler forms of the complex 
sentence, and the differences between them and compound 
sentences. 

e. The history of literature takes the biography of Longfellow, 

which can easily be connected with his poem, and the bio- 
graphy of Goldsmith, as reflected in " The Vagabond " and 
" The Traveller." 
/. Prosody. The poem " Columbus " may be treated as an 
example of blank verse (used also by Shakespeare, Words- 
worth, and Tennyson) : — 

Hyperbole — " A hand is stretched to him from out the dark." 
Alliteration — " The cordage creaks and rattles ; " 

" The sigh of some grim monster undescried j" 
" The wicked and the weak." 

In connection with " The Sailor's Grave," instances of 
crossed rhymes : — 

" There is in the lone, lone sea 
A spot unmarked, but holy ; 
For there the gallant and the free 
In his ocean bed lies lowly." 

In connection with " Stanzas to Freedom,"— 

Elegiacs — "They are slaves who dare not be 
In the right with two or three." 
Polysyndeton — " They sleep a calm and peaceful sleep." 

As in " The Building of the Ship " " plied " and " side," 
" force " and " course " rlryme, the pupil sees rhyme is de- 
termined, not by eye, as he would probably suppose, but by 
ear. 

Geography. 
The voyages of Columbus lead to a more detailed considera- 
tion of the sea, which may be connected with what the 
children have already learned on the same subject in Robin- 
son Crusoe. We may consider — 



148 Introduction to HerbarPs Science and Tract ice of Education 

Open and inland seas ; 
Colour and motion of the sea ; 
Taste of sea-water, salt deserts. 
Boys may take a more detailed description of a ship, and here 

again there is connected material in Robinson Crusoe. 
Columbus sailed the Atlantic Ocean. The name suggests the 
fabled Atlantis and its remains, which are supposed still to 
exist in several groups of islands. 
Pieces of pumice stone are found floating at sea. This fact 
leads to the volcanic nature of the sea-bottom, and particu- 
larly to the description of groups of islands of volcanic 
origin. 

The Lesser Antilles. 
Columbus touched first at the Canary Isles, and later landed 
on an island of the Bahama Group (compare natural 
history material). 

The fact that the Spaniards made settlements on the Greater 
Antilles, leads to a description of these islands. The 
treasures which Columbus sent as proofs of his successful 
discoveries, give occasion to treat of the significance of the 
Greater Antilles in the world's commerce (compare 
natural science material). 

After considering the West Indies, the name of which is 
explained by reference to Columbus's voyages, we may pass 
to 

The North American Mainland, 
the middle and northern parts of which will be described, 
while the southern part will be left till the discovery and 
conquest of Mexico are treated of. 

The poem " Hiawatha " supplies connecting points for con- 
sidering the Indians : form, character, religion, modes of 
life, habits, and customs. 

The poem " Bermuda " leads to a description of the farmer's 
life and occupations (emigrants ; primeval forests ; prairies). 

As a contrast, the consideration of social and commercial life 
in great towns (wealth ; luxury ; industry) may be taken 
in this connection. 



Practical Pedagogy 149 



Commercial intercourse between the old and new worlds leads 
to a notice of the means of intercourse : Steamers, Trans- 
atlantic Cable, Pacific Railway, etc. 

On his last voyage, Columbus tried to find a passage through 
Central America from the Atlantic to the Pacific Ocean. 
This leads to the description of the land, and to the men- 
tion of the commencement of the Panama Canal (engineer ; 
comparison with Suez Canal : the use of both). 

The idea Columbus had of reaching India from the west, must 
be understood together with the spherical shape of the 
earth. This is the connecting point for astronomical geo- 
graphy, as also are the trade winds, sea currents, degrees of 
warmth, eclipse of the moon, all of which find a place in the 
voyages of Columbus. 

Natural History. 

a. Description of natural features. 

Columbus found in the Saragossa Sea large masses of sea-weed. 

1. Description of unicellular seaweed. 

2. General description of marine vegetation. 

The fact that the seaweed is torn from its place of growth 
and sinks}- leads to the 

Origin of Coal. 
The carbonization of wood fibre in a piece of wood, which has 

been kept by water from contact with air, is shown. An 

excursion should be made to a turf or coal-pit, if possible. 
Consideration of the difference between black coal, brown 

coal, and peat, with reference to their origin. 
The Bahama Islands, on which Columbus landed, are coral 

islands ; therefore here follows 

A Description of Organ Coral. 
With the description of these islands formed by coral, can be 
connected that of the 

Precious or Blood Coral, 
as well as other valuable productions of the sea-bottom, viz., 
the pearl-shell — comparison with the precious pearl — and 
sponges. 



150 Introduction to Herbarfs Science and Practice of Education 

Among other creatures of the sea 

The Shark should be described j 
among plants, 

The Sugar-cane ; l 
and from the mineral kingdom gold, upon the acquisition 
of which the Spaniards directed all their force j or this 
can be reserved till the conquest of Mexico. 

b. Physics. 

Columbus took as his guide at sea the mariner's compass. 
Description of it. 

A sewing needle should be magnetized and balanced, when 
it will, like the needle of the compass, point to the north. 
This circumstance, in connection with the fact, that the 
compass needle during Columbus's first voyage pointed 
towards the west, introduces the subject of earth mag- 
netism. Magnetism must be treated in some detail at this 
point (electro-magnetism). 

The descriptions of the treasures of the sea lead to the 
question how they reach daylight, and thus to the descrip- 
tion of 

Divers. 
Experiments and apparatus generally ; 
The diving-bell, and swimming. 

c. Chemistry. 

If gold be described, the difference between precious and 
base metals must be pointed out. This leads to the oxidiz- 
ing of iron and copper. 

The possibility of breathing in the diving-bell and the 
necessity of the conveyance of fresh air thereto, point to 
the elements of the air (oxygen). 



1 The tobacco and potato plants can also be taken here unless, in con- 
sideration of the large amount of material available, they are reserved 
till their introduction into Eng and is given. 



Practical Pedagogy 151 



Arithmetic. 

Arithmetic at this stage has to teach fractions. The nature of 
fractions may be illustrated by making a compass card. 
The line from north to south divides the compass in halves, 
the line from east to west in quarters. The next subdivision 
gives eighths, the next sixteenths, and the last thirty- 
seconds, with which the usual division of the compass 
ends. The nature of proper and improper, simple and 
mixed fractions, reduction of fractions, may be demon- 
strated by means of it. For the two last operations the 
division of the compass into degrees is particularly useful. 

A further exercise would be the division of a circular grass- 
plot or garden-bed. 

Decimal fractions should be taught as the complements of 
whole numbers, from one backwards. They can, however, 
be taught in connection with vulgar fractions. 

The amount of alloy in gold supplies arithmetical matter for 
ordinary calculations in fractions. Further, we may reckon, 
for example, what proportion of the entire population of 
Cuba are (a) white ; (b) coloured ; (c) Asiatic ; (d) negroes. 
In using decimal fractions, the rate per cent, must be found. 
Again, we can exercise vulgar as well as decimal fractions 
in calculating the receipts, expenditure, debts, imports 
and exports, of the West India Islands, the relation 
between supply and demand in those islands, the propor- 
tion of tobacco produced in Germany and Cuba, and the 
postal and telegraph service with the West Indies and 
North American States. 1 It cannot be denied that a care- 
ful collection of statistics is necessary, if we are to obtain 
matter for arithmetic lessons from lessons on objects. 
Handbooks of geography and the encyclopaedia, however, 
contain much of the necessary material. In the business 
advertisements of every newspaper, we can find arith- 
metical examples from practical life. 



1 The necessary numbers can be taken from the tariff, which may be 
obtained at an} 7 post-office. 



152 Introduction to Ilerbarfs Science and Practice of Education 

The suggestions for the following subjects are made by Ufer, 
though they have not yet been practically applied by him : — 

Geometry. 
With the compass lessons, lessons on the circle may be con- 
nected. The lines which mark the direction of the heavens 
are radii forming the diameter. The declination of the 
needle leads to the division of the circle into degrees, and 
this again to the measurement of angles by degrees. Then 
follow lessons on the ellipse and the oval, and comparison 
of them with the circle. The measurement of the circle 
may follow later, and in connection with a concrete exam- 
ple — for instance, the measurement of a circular grass- 
plot. 

Drawing. 
Figures (ornamental) are drawn consisting of circles, ellipses, 
ovals, or their parts. They may be found in any large 
work on drawing. 
Experiments remain to be made, whether the forms of sea-life 
(shells, star-fish, sea nettles) or tropical plant3 are suitable 
as drawing copies for this stage, and, again, whether some 
material can be taken from the history of the develop- 
ment of art. 

Singing. 
(Here also English material similar to the German is substituted 
for it.) 
There is a wealth of material for use in singing. There are 
religious songs connected with the life of Jesus, and many 
devout moments in the life of Columbus which can be 
concentrated in a hymn. 
Before starting on his voyage he prayed. This may suggest 
Charles Wesley's two hymns, 

u God of my life, whose gracious power," 

and 

" Forth in Thy name, O Lord, I go." 

When he landed, he returned thanks to God. Connected 

hymn, 

" Now thank we all our God." 



Practical Pedagogy 153 



To the life of Columbus as a whole the hymns apply, 

'* The Lord my pasture shall prepare," 
and 

" Jesus, Lover of my soul," 

and Whit tier's hymn embodies the lesson of his death, 
" God calls our loved ones, but we lose not wholly 
What He has given ; 
They live on earth in thought and deed, as truly 
As in His heaven." 

To many it will appear strange, that religious songs should 
be sung in connection with secular subjects. It must be 
remembered that occurrences similar to those in the life of 
Col ambus are to be found in the child's life, and expressed 
in song. 

Maritime songs may be introduced : "Kule, Britannia," " Ye 
Mariners of England," " Tom Bowling," and " Toll for the 
Brave." Any difficulties in the text of these may be intro- 
duced and explained in the lesson on English. 

French. 
The Atala of Chateaubriand should be read, or Paul and Vir- 
ginia, by Bernardin de St. Pierre. The grammar must 
be connected with the readings. 

The assertion made by the adherents of the dual theory, that 
connecting points only are made between the different branches, 
seems to make it clear, that they do not aim at any systematic 
connection between the subjects of the curriculum. All that 
appears to be implied is, that problems, facts, examples, sugges- 
tions, can be taken from the concentration subjects for the rest, 
and apperception is strengthened thereby. For instance in the 
series just illustrated, the seaweed would be described under 
botany, and the compass is used in arithmetic to illustrate frac- 
tions and decimals. 

The following English material has been suggested to follow 
the first and second culture epochs (fairy tales and Rohinson 
Crusoe), which would remain the same for English schools, and 
to run parallel to the concentration centres of Ziller : third year, 
Old English Legends, characteristic of the earliest days, which 



154 Introduction to Herbert's Science and Practice of Education 

may be chosen without a strict regard to chronology ; they 
would, above all, include the legends of King Arthur and the 
Round Table, R-obin Hood, etc. : fourth and fifth years, 
The Settlement of England, as presented in its legends (see 
Freeman's Old English History), The Anglo-Saxon Forefathers, 
The Danes, and The Christianization of England (Egbert, 
Alfred, Canute, Augustine, Paulinus, Dunstan, etc.) : sixth 
year, Great English Kings from William the Conqueror to the 
Wars of the Roses : seventh year, Renaissance, Reformation, 
Age of Discovery to 1763 : eighth year, Development of Modern 
England. l 

The reader can now to some extent judge for himself whether, 
as Prof. Rein and the adherents of the dual theory maintain, 
the connection between the material of the different subjects 
can be so kept up as to form true apperception, or whether, as 
Voigt and its opponents contend, the connection is so weak that 
any real apperception is impossible. 

1 Quoted from Rein's Outlines of Pedagogics, translated by C. and T. 
van Liew. 



CHAPTER IV 

MORAL STRENGTH OF CHARACTER ; GOVERNMENT AND 
DISCIPLINE 

Section I. — Government 

insigLt alone Educative instruction has so to form the circle 

insufficient to f thought, that from it will proceeds. Willing 
form the will. & ' , -, • 

presumes, as we have already seen, a certain 

degree of insight ; without insight there is no will. But 

it presumes more. "With insight, interest, which in Herbart's 

psychology is the root of will, must be combined. The aim 

of an educative instruction is thus to create an insight 

which impels the will to do what it ought. 

From insight, the pupil must learn whether the aim and 

means of his action are morally commendable. If instruction 

has created an insight in accordance with the moral ideas, 

which impels to will, its aim is accomplished, but by no means 

the aim of education. If the latter stopped at this point, it 

would form cultivated men whose morality would teach them 

what to do and leave undone, men who ardently desired good 

and condemned evil, but yet whose will and insight might not 

be in harmony with each other, when obedience to the moral 

involved difficulties and self-sacrifice. The actions of such 

men would be almost entirely determined by circumstances, 

and with them their volitions would change. The very nature 

of their will would be variable, as, although the moral insight 

might be perfect, the will to act upon it might be infirm ; none 

could predict what in a given case their actions would be. 

On such characters no reliance could be placed ; they would 

be, and often are, bending reeds, moved hither and thither by 

chance winds. 

155 



156 Iiitroduction to Herbarfs Science and Praciico Education 



Discipline used Hence it follows, that another educative activity 
Srmatfonof * s required, if willing in its entirety is to be 
character, always in harmony with the moral ideas. This 
influence is discipline, 1 culture in a narrower sense, or direct 
formation of character. The teacher using it seeks to 
strengthen right willing, on the basis of a right insight 
gained by instruction. Thus it follows, discipline can only 
accomplish its work, when and in so far as the teacher has 
done the work of instruction successfully, i.e., created moral 
insight. Discipline, therefore, commences later than the 
beginning of instruction, and moves with it side by side. 
Before the child, however, has gained insight, his actions 
must be under control ; he must be punctual, quiet, cleanly, 
orderly, diligent. When he transgresses in such matters, 
his intention is not evil ; hence these faults are not morally 
blamable. But they are disturbing, and hinder the teacher's 
work ; they injure others, often the child himself, and if not 
checked, form the fruitful germs of bad habits. What the 
child is to do and leave undone before he attains to insight, 
belongs to government. 

There are thus in Herbart's system of education three 
educational activities: government, instruction, and dis- 
cipline. Instruction has already been treated of under the 
head of practical pedagogy ; we pass on now to government. 

The aim of ^ ts a * m * s not to ^ orm character, but to keep 
government, order, to check everything which, though not 



1 The term Zucht, translated here and in the Science of Educa- 
tion by discipline, is used by Herbart to signify that part of education, 
the aim of which is direct formation of character. It must not be con- 
founded with the term discipline, or Zucht, when used by other German 
writers, notably by Kant, as the exact equivalent of that part of educa- 
tion called by Herbart government (Hegierung), the aim of which is 
to maintain order, and thereby prepare the way for the work of instruc- 
tion and discipline. As a rendering of Zucht, discipline, as the term 
is used in England, appears to be a better rendering of Herbart's than 
the alternative one: training. A well-disciplined character suggests 
that personal activity of the pupil in the process of its formation which 
was to Herbart an indispensable, indeed, the most important factor; 
while a well-trained character suggests the teacher, or some other 
external influence only as its maker. 



Moral Strength of Character ; Government and Disripliiie 157 

intentional, and therefore not intrinsically bad, disturbs 
the work of instruction and discipline, troubles parents 
and teachers, or harms them and the child himself Herbart 
calls it " the requisite presumption of education ; it has no 
aim to attain in the child's disposition, except to create a 
spirit of order." 1 " It works for the present, and thereby differs 
from both instruction and discipline, which both work for 
future culture." 2 

Measures em- The measures employed by teachers and parents 
ployed by f or the government of children, are comprised 

government : x 

first, under four heads. Occupation. — "The basis of 
all government is occupation." 3 Here another 
distinction between government and instruction is apparent. 
" In instruction, what is to be taught and learned must in 
no wise be left to chance ; in government, what is learned 
is indifferent so long as naughtiness be subdued," 4 The great 
object is not that the child shall gain mentally, but that his 
time shall be occupied. " Self-chosen occupations are the 
best, but the child must be helped to follow them out regularly 
and consecutively, so that they do not degenerate into mere 
aimless play, of which he soon wearies. It is very desirable 
that adults who have sufficient patience, should join in 
children's games (which are an important part of occupation), 
explain pictures, and tell them stories." 5 

One of the most important parts of occupation is play. It 
keeps the child from idleness and all its attendant evils, and 
checks the growth of harmful habits which have their root 
in it. 

second Supervision — Herbart's opinion about strict 

supervision, supervision is clearly and emphatically given in 
the Science of Education, The evils of it are, it leads 
directly to deceitful efforts to escape it, because it is so bur- 
densome ; the need for it grows with use ; it stifles origin- 
ality ; it prevents children from winning that self-knowledge 
which can only be obtained in free self-activity; in a word, 



1 Umriss padagogisclier Vorlesungen, 44. 2 Ibid., 57. 8 Ibid., 46. 
* Ibid., 61. 5 Ibid., 47. 



158 Introduction to Her barfs Science and Practice of Education 

it defeats the very end of all education: the formation of 
character. " Those who grow up merely passive as obedient 
children, have no character when they are released from 
supervision. The old pedagogy betrayed its weakness in 
nothing so much as its dependence upon compulsion, the 
modern in nothing so much as the emphatic value it places 
upon supervision." On this point Herbart and Rousseau are 
in accord. " Let the child," says Rousseau, "run about, play, 
fall down a hundred times a day, the oftener the better, as 
he will the sooner learn to get up again by himself. The 
boon of freedom is worth many scars. You will make a mere 
animal of him, if you are continually directing him." The 
mere presence of a teacher, if he be loved and respected, is, 
according to Herbart, sufficient to keep children in due 
bounds and make severer measures unnecessary. 

tm d and Threatening and punishment. — In these measures 
fourth: of government, an essential difference between 
and punish- its procedures and those of discipline becomes 
apparent. Bad action, " the intention, so far 
as it becomes, or could become, act, is," says Herbart, " to be 
richly punished." " Of the bad will," by which it is only 
apparently prompted, " the teacher at this stage must take 
no notice," for the reason that will in the true sense does 
not yet exist in the child. The correction of the bad w T ill — 
in Herbart's words, " wounding the desire to do evil " 1 — is 
reserved for the punishments of discipline, when moral insight 
has to some extent been formed, and the child can at least 
partially recognise the goodness of the teacher's will, and 
the justice of the punishments he inflicts. Because insight 
is not possible to the little child, Rousseau would abolish 
punishments of every kind entirely. " Inflict upon the child 
no kind of punishment ; . . . his actions being without, moral 
quality, he can do nothing morally bad, or which deserves 
punishment or reproof." 2 Herbart, on the contrary, would 
inflict punishments, not directed upon the will, which he sees 
with Rousseau does not exist, but simply to subdue what 

1 Science of Education, p. 99. 2 Eniile, Rousseau, Book III. 



Moral Strength of Character ; Government and Discipline 159 

he calls " the principle of disorder, the wild impetuosity," 1 
which at present occupies the place of the true will, and with 
the sole object of establishing the habit of obedience. 
Obedience is of two kinds. Either the child obeys the 
teacher's will without knowing his reasons, or this will 
is carried out when the pupil has made it his own, after 
due consideration. The latter is the obedience created 
and appealed to by discipline ; the former is the obedience 
established by government — in Herbart's words, " blind 
obedience,'* " passive obedience to authority." The former, 
" obedience which can be associated with the child's own 
will, is only to be expected as the result of a somewhat 
advanced stage of genuine education." 2 

Reasoning with As a nat ural corollary of the preceding, Herbart, 
little children, unlike Locke, and like Rousseau, condemns the 
habit of reasoning with the child who is still under govern- 
ment. " The tone of government, unlike that of discipline," 
is short and sharp; "the child submits to it because he 
must." 3 Its object is not to form character, but to inspire 
awe. Neither reasons nor explanations ought to be given ; 
all punishments should be enforced, without pointing out to the 
child the naughtiness of the mischief done, without exciting 
his mind. They must be to him as a natural, necessary 
consequence by which he will be trained and made wise. 
Locke, on the contrary, not only considered children should 
be reasoned with, but also that they were capable of it, and 
it should be begun with them, as soon as they could speak : 
11 I cannot but think that reasoning is the true way of dealing 
with children. They understand it as early as they do 
language." 4 This and his idea that the love of credit and 
fear of shame and disgrace can be appealed to in little 
children, 5 seem to have originated in a common error, i.e., 
that intellectual power and moral insight are already consider- 
ably developed in the child. " It is labour lost," says Kant, 
" to speak of duty to children. One ought not to try to call 



* Science of Education, p. 95. 2 Ibid., p. 102. 3 Ibid., p. 234. 
4 Thoughts on Education, Locke (Pitt Series), p. 60. 5 Ibid., p. 34. 



160 Introduction to Herbarfs Science and Practice of Education 

into play with children the fear of shame, but to wait for this, 
till the period of youth comes. In fact, it cannot be developed 
in them till the idea of honour has already taken root there." 
Rousseau declares, like Herbart, the impossibility of reasoning 
with children : " I find nothing more stupid than children 
who have been so much reasoned with. Reason, apparently a 
compound of all other faculties, the one latest developed and 
with the most difficulty, is the one proposed as agent in 
unfolding the faculties earliest used ! The noblest work 
of education is to make a reasoning man, and we expect to 
train a young child by making him reason ! This is beginning 
at the end ; this is making an instrument of a result. I would 
rather require a child ten years old to be five feet tall, than to 
be judicious." l 

_ .. .. Herbart's expression "threats in case of need 

Herbart's view i • » •> 

of corporal enforced by compulsion ' 3 as used by government, 
punishment. / v ' J . 6 . . . ' 

suggests the question, What was his opinion in 

regard to corporal punishment ? Not that of Locke : " The rod 
is a slavish discipline, which makes a slavish temper ; there 
is one, and but one, fault for which I think children should be 
beaten, and that is obstinacy or rebellion." 3 Nor was it that 
of Rousseau, who, as before mentioned, would " inflict no 
punishment whatever." "Corporal punishments" (here used 
in the wide sense of chastisement, confinement, deprivation of 
food, etc.), says Herbart, " which come in when reproof is un- 
availing, cannot be entirely dispensed with. But they ought 
to be so rare, that they are feared rather as something impend- 
ing than as actually carried into effect." Above all, he points 
out, they are to be carefully regulated by, and adapted to, the 
age and stage of the pupil's development: "It does not hurt 
the boy to remember he sometimes had the rod when a child. 
Again, it does not hurt him if he places the impossibility of his 
now having the rod on the same level as the impossibility that 
he could deserve it. But such a severe wound to his sense of 
honour would certainly be hurtful to him, if he already thought 



1 Enile, Rousseau, p. 52. 2 Science of Education, p. 102. 
3 Thougldii on Education, Locke, pp. 30, 56. 



Moral Strength of Character ; Government and Discipline 161 

little of bodily pain ; and in the highest degree it becomes 
harmful when children, already hardened by beating, receive 
more. The greatest callousness is its result, and we can hardly 
hope that long care, now become indispensable, will bring back 
natural feeling." 1 

The means by which these measures of govern- 
A £v6to*guide nient are to be regulated and used are, says Her- 
of government ^art, authority and love : an authority which must 
" depend on superiority of mind " 2 ; a love which 
" must never degenerate into undue indulgence." " That au- 
thority and love secure government better than any harsher 
means, is well known. Kindness stops just at the point where 
government is most necessary, and love must never be pur- 
chased by weak indulgence. It is only of value when combined 
with the necessary severity." 3 Since " nature has entrusted 
these means of government — authority and love — to the parents, 
it is best left in their hands." If however it passes into the 
hands of others, it should be carried on with as little friction 
as possible, and the amount of this, adds Herbart as a warning, 
depends on the proportion which the children's activity bears 
to the amount of free play they get. 

The teacher who has authority and the children's love, 
easily wins their obedience. " The mind instinctively bends 
to authority. When children are healthy," says Herbart, 
" government in early life is comparatively simple, and, once 
tractableness is formed, can be easily carried on. But it must 
not be interrupted. If children are only left to themselves or 
strangers for a few days, the difference is apparent; it costs 
trouble to adjust the reins, and this must not be done sud- 
denly." 4 Hence he lays much stress upon the value of " that 
strict regularity of daily life, which some parents carefully pro- 
vide for through their household arrangements. This, how- 
ever, must never become so painfully strict, that it unduly 
represses children's natural energy." 5 

When government has been successful, the pupil has learned 

1 JJmriss pddagogischer Vorlesungen, 51. 2 Science of Education, p. 99. 
8 JJmriss pddagogischer Vorlesungen, 53. 4 Ibid., 54. 
* Science of Education, p. 218. 

M 



1 62 Introduction to Herb art's Science and Practice of Education 

obedience ; moreover, he has unconsciously become habituated 
to order, cleanliness, diligence, punctuality, etc. Government 
has thereby prepared the ground in the child's soul, upon 
which instruction and discipline are to work in the future. 

Section II.— Discipline 

The aim of We come now to the third division of education— 
discipline. oliscipline — w hich deserves the teacher's most care- 
ful attention and thought, for it deals with nothing less than 
the moral foundation of character, the method by which the 
circle of thought may be brought to generate the good will. 
Contrast of ^ we C0Iltrast discipline with government, the 

discipline with essential differences in their natures and functions 
government. . 

become apparent, it is these differences which, 

although discipline and government sometimes use the same 
measures, determine, in Herbart's words, the " distinctions in 
their mode of use." J 

To government the child submits because he must, to dis- 
cipline because he wills to do so. " Discipline finds room only 
so far as an inward experience persuades its pupil to submit 
to it willingly ; its power only reaches so far as the pupil's 
assent meets it." The tone of government is " short and sharp ; 
that of discipline is continuous, persevering, slowly pene- 
trating, only ceasing by degrees." Government " subdues by 
force " ; " discipline is a moulding power which animates while 
it constrains, but follows there, and there only, its natural direc- 
tion when it directly encourages and attracts." 2 As regards the 
punishments of government, " the teacher must guard against 
mingling with them any of that personal influence acting on 
the mind, which ought to remain in reserve for the punish- 
ments of discipline alone ; in the punishments of discipline, the 
teacher's personal influence is, as hereafter shown, all-im- 
portant." The punishments of government merely a render the 
deserved quantum of good or ill, no matter in what way " ; 
" those of discipline avoid the positive and arbitrary as much 
as possible, and it lays hold, when it can, solely of the natural 

1 Science of Education, p. 229. 2 Ibid., p. 234. 



Moral Strength of Character ; Government and Discipline 163 

consequences of actions." " He who wastes his time must lose 
pleasure ; he who spoils his things must be deprived of them ; 
he who eats too much must have bitter medicine ; he who 
chatters, be sent away." 1 As to the nature of reward, Herbart 
writes, " Spoiling by continuous unnecessary pleasure, by 
artificially produced enjoyments, connected neither with work 
nor training, is harmful, because the blunting of sensibility 
which results therefrom, deprives discipline of many minor aids 
which it can profitably use with children. Little is needed to 
give pleasure in a variety of ways, when temperateness is the 
habit of daily life " 2 The punishments of government " are 
bound to a proportionate retribution ; those of discipline are 
preferably not so. The latter must only be so meted out that 
they always appear to the individual as well-meant warnings, 
and do not excite lasting opposition to the teacher." 3 Govern- 
ment must disappear sooner than discipline ; the teacher who 
" uses the same act with older, that served him well with 
younger, children," who continues to govern when the pupil is 
sufficiently developed to be disciplined, " produces a strained 
relationship, which continues intolerable and irremediable dur- 
ing the whole future." 4 

The work of discipline is to ensure that the pupil 
mustSSp sna ll not on ly during the period of education, but 

to form a a ] s0 afterwards, will only what can stand before the 
moral will. ' J 

moral judgment, and not will what is opposed to it. 

Its effort then must be " that the willing of the pupil shall re- 
ceive a direction determined by the moral ideas, that every 
later act of volition shall carry the impress of a personality, 
which has placed its will entirely in the service of those moral 
ideas." 

The To understand the way by which such a direction 

principle of may be given, the nature of willing must be under- 
apperception J ^. ' . ° 

applied to for- stood. Willing, as already noticed, grows out 01 

'desire, when with the latter its attainment seems 

possible. Thus reflection, occupied with the difficulties, duties, 

1 Tmriss padagoghcher Vorlesungen, 157. 2 Ibid., 157. 
3 tcieae of Education, p. 243. 4 Ibid., p. 229. 



164 Introduction to Herbarfs Science and Practice of Education 

motives, etc. involved, precedes willing. Consequently, with 
every act of willing, a large number of presentations are simul- 
taneously raised into consciousness, by what has been previously 
termed active reproduction. 1 In consequence of this reproduc- 
tion, the presentations in question assume a united character- 
With the attainment of what is willed, pleasure is combined ; 
a picture of the act of willing remains in the mind, in which an 
impulse dwells to become as clear as possible, to realize itself, 
i.e.y to reproduce that feeling of pleasure which made itself felt 
at the first willing. Such a will-picture created by a single 
instance is called " single volition " (Einzelwollung). The 
oftener, then, precisely the same act of willing is repeated, the 
stronger will be the " single volition." The connection between 
this fact and the law that identical presentations coalesce to 
form a single clear presentation, is obvious. 2 Ultimately, by 
the fusion of these acts of willing with the single volition, a 
definite habit of willing is formed, a habit which, if fostered 
long enough, cannot be given up. 

Let us suppose that such a will-picture is formed in the mind, 
and that a new willing similar to, not identical with, the for- 
mer arises from the circle of thought. Then, in obedience to 
the law of similarity, the presentations determining the first 
willing are set in motion, and simultaneously the will-picture 
then acquired rises into consciousness. This will-picture strives 
to attain clearness, examines the new willing, finds that it lies 
in the same direction as itself, and that through its realization, 
the impulse dwelling in the older will-picture will, on the 
whole, be satisfied. Thus the new willing, strengthened by 
the old picture, is much more energetically realized than it 
would otherwise be. Two analogous will-pictures now exist, 
which operate on each other in the same way as analogous pre- 
sentations. 3 As with the latter, identical elements combine 
to form ultimately a psychic or logical concept, so the identical 
elements in the individual acts of willing attract each other 

1 S3e p. 29. 2 See p. 23. 

3 S-e p. 23. For the sake of clearness, we think of the will-pictures, 
to begin with, as apart ; in reality their combination takes place during 
tue act of willing. 



Moral Strength of Character ; Government and Discipline 165 

mutually. They repel all that is disparate and contradictory 
in the presentations wherein they originate, and melt into a 
new will-picture, which is not only stronger and more vivid, but 
also purer, since it is kept free from the individual peculiarities 
of the single volition. Herbart refers to this fact — that the 
laws which govern the mutual action of presentations govern 
also the formation of will— in these words : " I am astonished 
that a parallel has not been more carefully drawn between the 
constancy of our conceptions and the constancy of willing, which 
goes to make up the chief basis of the objective part of cha- 
racter." l The single volition has now grown into a more 
general will, which may be compared with the psychic concept. 
Like the psychic concept, which is made more general, and 
approaches the logical concept by additional perceptions, this 
more general will becomes with each new similar willing, yet 
more general, until out of the fusions of single willings the 
ivill is formed. The effect of previous will-pictures, both good 
and bad, upon present willing is finely estimated by one of our 
greatest English prose poets in the following words : " Our 
lives make a moral tradition for our individual selves, as the 
life of mankind at large makes a moral tradition for the race, 
and to have once acted greatly seems a reason why we should 
always be noble. But Tito was feeling the effect of an opposite 
tradition : he had won no memories of self-conquest and perfect 
faithfulness from which he could have a sense of falling." 2 

f d's- ^P ^° ^ S P°^ nt we Dave assumed that the single 
pavatepre- willings have been met by a will similar in nature 
the formation to themselves. What would be the psychical pro- 
W1 ' cess were they met by a will opposed to them- 
selves? Perhaps the already-acquired will-picture would be 
reproduced by the law of contrast, and the former, finding that 
the new willing was at variance with itself, and thus that the 
clearness after which it was striving was checked by it, would 
suppress the new willing. If however every act of volition 
were not suppressed which was entirely at variance with the 
already-acquired will-picture, either the latter would be wanting 

1 Science of Education, p. 202. 2 Momola, chap, xxxix. 



1 66 Introduction to Htrbart's Science and Practice of Education 

in essential force, or it would be entirely unreproduced ; in other 
words, memory of the will would be weak or altogether gone. 

Memory of the will (reproduction of the will- 
Memory of the . \ 1 1 1 

win : its picture) depends, as we have seen, on the movement 

of the presentations in whose interactions the will- 
picture originated. Herbart terms it " the primary requisite of 
character," and shows that "it stands in closest connection 
with the degree of the mind's mobility. The slow-minded, those 
who live in their own world, hold, pursue, cultivate their own 
objects, are difficult to move from their track, and often 
appear stubborn and stupid, without being either the one or 
the other ; these, if they are clear-minded also, possess the 
healthy will, which when once won, affords education a firm 
footing, because in them memory of the will is strongest." 
If the will-picture is to be clear and vigorous, the presen- 
tations must be closely combined. This is the case after 
energetic and matured reflection ; an act of will which has 
cost us that can be recalled vividly to memory. Further, 
the whole circle of thought must be so interconnected that 
the presentations essential to the will at any moment are 
immediately set in motion, in order that the influence of the 
will-picture on the new willing is not too late in its operation, 
and does not first put in its appearance when the new willing 
has already passed into action. In the latter case the old will- 
picture encounters a new one, finished and unlike itself, the 
results of the encounter being, that the old will is checked 
in its effort after clearness, and a feeling of pain (remorse) is 
caused thereby. When memory of the will is strong, and 
action so rapid, that apperception between the cumulative 
will and the single willing takes place unconsciously, it 
becomes " the inexorable law of human souls, that we pre- 
pare ourselves for sudden deeds, by the reiterated choice of 
good or evil, that gradually determines character." 1 Memory of 
will then depends on the firm union and systematic order of the 
presentations. The influence which instruction exercises over 
memory of the will becomes very obvious at this point, and its 

1 IZomola, George Eliot, p. 205. 



Moral Strength of Character ; Government a?id Discipline 167 

effect on the entire culture of the Will, will be still more 
apparent later on. 

The older cumulative will examines and tests the 
results of will new — the potential act of will — thus : The two 
appercep ion. ger ^ es f presentations which form the basis of the 
cumulative will and the potential act of will face each other, as 
it were, a while, and the older and stronger series, that in 
which the cumulative will resides, examines whether in the 
more recent, weaker, potential volition, there are sufficient 
elements similar to its own, for a fusion of the two masses of 
thought to take place. If not, and they are opposed to each 
other in many essential elements, the single act cannot be 
apperceived by the cumulative will, and the latter repels the 
former as untenable. In common parlance, we abandon our 
resolution because " second thoughts are best," or because " on 
reflection we look at the thing differently." If, on the other 
hand, the single willing and the cumulative will are harmo- 
nious, a fusion, an apperception, takes place. The masses of 
thought thus united reach a totality of effort far exceeding 
that which the single willing could have attained. The latter 
gains a high degree of energy and power of resistance, while 
the cumulative will is strengthened by the single willing newly 
apperceived. 

The examination of the new presentation series 
HertartSVm- by tne °^ as to tne suitability of the former 
pl theterau f ^ or ^eing apperceived, calls forth a judgment, 
whether the single willing is or is not harmonious 
with the cumulative will. Since the cumulative will strives 
to attain clearness with this judgment, a command or a 
prohibition to the new act of will is combined with it. This 
combination of judgment and command, when it applies not 
merely to a single instance, but to a class of many such, is 
called a principle or maxim. 

He who is taught when young to feed the hungry, gains 
in time a cumulative will directed to the aid of all in need. 
Every single willing which harmonizes with the cumulative 
will is strengthened ; every one opposing it is repelled. A 
general judgment is formed, which on every occasion comes 



1 68 Introduction to Herbarfs Science and Practice of Education 

forth as a prohibition or command. This judgment (practical 
principle, maxim) is " Help thy neighbour in his need." As it 
applied to all previous cognate cases, it supplies a norm for 
every future act of will of the same class. If it rises to a 
psychic force, the future existence of an entire class of voli- 
tions in harmony with morality, is secured. 

If an ethical principle is to become a psychical power and 
rule the single willings through its apperceiving force, it 
must not be merely commanded, learned. If it is to rule the 
life, it must be rooted in and through life, for true maxims 
are nothing more nor less than part of a man's experience 
in life. Maxims originating in reflection (as, for instance, in 
instruction) must be lived, if they are to become real. Their 
constant use must develop a habit founded on insight which 
cannot be given up. 

w . . Discipline must lead the pupil to place all 
The subjective r , . , . . 

partofcha- classes of volition under the rule of living moral 

growth of later maxims, if a " calm great passion for the good" 

is to be created. But it must be carefully noted 

that maxims, principles, etc., belong to the subjective side of 

character, and this is mainly formed during the later years 

of education, when the teacher is leading the pupil, under the 

guidance of discipline, through " a making he himself discovers 

when choosing the good and rejecting the bad, to form his own 

character." A lifetime indeed is insufficient to build up the 

subjective side of character, to reach the ideal of morality. 

The teacher can only prepare the basis of it, and direct and 

regulate its early growth by discipline. " The stamping in of 

maxims," says Herbart, " on little children, even when 

everything goes as well as possible, unduly hastens and 

disturbs the subjective formation of character, besides being 

harmful to childlike ingenuousness." 

It is to the " objective part of character, that 

^de°of e e£ e which forms and raises itself slowly enough under 

eaSer^rowth ^e influence of education, to which the teacher 

must at first devote his chief attention." 1 For to 



1 Science of Education, p. 202. 



Moral Strength of Character; Government and Discipline 169 

it belong the whole of the child's inclinations and desires, 
which will be presented to the judgment, to be sanctioned 
and raised into principles by the subjective, during the later 
years of education and the rest of life. These desires must 
be regulated and corrected ; the teacher must check and 
eradicate some, generate, encourage, and strengthen others, 
using for that purpose the wealth of many-sided interest 
provided by instruction, and doing it by the constraining, 
attractive power of discipline. When the formation of the 
objective does not precede that of the subjective, and the de- 
sires are allowed to develop under the mere external constraint 
of regulating maxims, the boy will probably afterwards form 
his maxims to suit his inclinations, that he may enjoy the 
inward prescriptive right to do as he pleases. For the sub- 
jective readily finds principles answering to the inclinations. 
The man who is mean in little things will justify himself 
by the maxim, "Take care of the pence; the pounds will 
take care of themselves." "If the objective side — the desires — 
be bad, and the subjective does not sanction them — that is, if 
the latter be morally pure, so that the judgment it passes on the 
self is as impartial as that it would pass on a stranger "* — the 
two sides of character are not in harmony, and " those which 
combined would have strengthened it, now chafe and dis- 
integrate it." 2 If the desires are bad, and the subjective 
sanctions them, the character is immoral ; if they are good, 
and recognized to be such by the subjective — " if they pass into 
the subjective of the character, and express themselves as 
principles 3 — the will takes law, the principle of order, and 
the objects of its endeavours, from what the intuitive judgment 
has marked with unqualified approval or disapproval." 4 The 
character is moral because the desires are placed in the 
service of the moral ideas. 

Herbart confronts the entire sphere of desire, 

tSeii^regSa- which is determinable, with the practical ideas of 

^cfpSne^ 3 " rectitude (right and equity), - s goodness, and 

inner freedom, by which it is determined. The 

1 Science of Education, p. 201 2 Ibid., p. 201. 3 Ibid., p. 208. 
4 Ibid., p. 261. * See pp. 70, 72. 



170 Introduction to Her barf s Science and Practice of Education 

two ideas of right and equity he combines in the Science 
of Education in one idea : that of rectitude. The reason 
for this combination in education of diverse ideas is, he 
explains, " because there they are generally created contem- 
poraneously and by the same circumstances; they enter into 
the same decisions, and therefore it is not easy to suppose 
that an ingenuous mind, which makes its moral insight more 
keen for the one, will not at the same time do so for the 
other." 1 The practical application of the twofold idea of 
rectitude is shown in the following passage: "We may lay 
it down as a principle never to disturb what exists among 
children " (i.e., any law they may make for themselves 
based on the idea of right) " without good reason " (i.e., 
a grave infringement of the idea of equity). " When disputes 
arise, we must first ascertain what has been settled and agreed 
upon amongst the children themselves " (idea of right), " and 
must take the part of the one who in any sort of way has 
been deprived of his own." Then we must try to help " each 
one to what he deserves," (idea of equity) " so far as this is 
possible, without violent injury to justice."? Herbart shows 
even amongst a children's community the working of one of his 
sociological ideas : that of an administrative system, derived 
from the idea of benevolence, 3 where eaGh member of society 
must contribute as much as possible to the welfare of the 
whole, that the State may be prosperous and well administered. 
With children this idea of an administrative system must be so 
used, " that we point beyond the idea of rectitude to what is best 
for the common good, as that to which it is right both property 
and merit shall be spontaneously sacrificed, and which will be 
for all the chief measure for future agreements." * 

With regard to the cultivation of the idea of rectitude in 
children, Herbart says, "When we want to cultivate the sense 
of right in children, we must carefulty distinguish the relation- 
ship of right which exists between children and adults, from 
that which exists between children themselves. In the former 



Science of Education, p. 260. 2 jy^ p , 261. 8 See p. 74. 
4 Science of Education, p. 261. 



Mora/ Strength of Character ; Government and Discipline 171 

we should give or entrust something under conditions, or give 
over anything that is harmless, entirely to their own control. 
For example, we ought not to complain when the boy plucks 
a flower which has been given him, or leaves his own piece 
of garden uncultivated. If children establish relationships 
of right among themselves, however, we ought to show and 
defend the highest aspect of the idea. If a boy takes his stand 
on his ' rights ' to the detriment of l benevolence,' the teacher can 
easily put him out of conceit of the ' rights,' or, better still, can 
be more sparing of his favours, which the boy cannot demand 
as a right. Children desist from their rights only too readily, 
when they think they are obliged to obey ; another time when 
this compulsion is not present, they will take good care not to 
do so. It is very difficult to make the child desist ' benevolently ' 
from his rights. Like the authority of great despots over little 
despots in a country, parents exercise a kind of sovereignty 
over their children's property. It obscures the conception of 
contract and right to meddle with things already given, or to 
threaten that if the child spoils them, they will be taken away. 
Instead of this, from the earliest years the idea of right in many 
aspects should be engraven on the child's innermost soul, so that 
he may learn to consider the rights of others sacred. It is of 
supreme importance in life." 1 

For the purposes of education, Herbart divides the desires, 
which he confronts in their entirety with these three practical 
ideas, into three groups: (1) those directed to what an individual 
chooses to endure ; (2) to what he wishes to possess ; (3) to 
what he wishes to do. Under the guidance of discipline, 
the first class in the child will be regulated by " exercises in 
patience," the second by " exercises in acquisitiveness," the 
third by " exercises in industry." 2 Of the last, play, which the 
teacher has watched, and in which he takes part with an un- 
derstanding sympathy, forms an important part. " We may 
always play with the child, guide him in playing to something 
useful, if we have previously understood the earnestness 
which lies in his play, and the spontaneous efforts with which 

1 Aphorismen zur Padagogik. 2 Science of Education, p. 257. 



172 hitroduction to Herbarf s Science and Practice of Education 

he will work himself out in happy moments, and also if we 
know how to abstain from such condescension as would 
check his upward efforts, for in such upward efforts in the 
childish things, which will soon be left behind, he would have 
received* instruction." 1 

With Locke and Rousseau, 2 Herbart attaches 
o?the7e°acher y i mmense importance to the personality of the 
teacher : to the superiority of mind by which he 
obtains authority : to the love which never stoops, except to 
raise the child ; to the discernment which will recognize the 
existent good in the child, and the nobility which will raise him 
by making it valuable in his eyes ; to the equableness of 
behaviour, the consistency and justice of treatment, which will 
help to preserve and increase in the child that all-important 
factor in the formation of character, memory of the will. On 
the personality of the teacher greatly depend the force and 
efficacy of approbation and blame, most important measures of 
discipline in Herbart's system. 

Herbart has happily called giving joy by deserved 
"\nd blame 1 a PP roDa tion " the fine art of discipline." He care- 
fully distinguishes it from praise, which he con- 
siders "mostly poisonous to the young, nnking them proud and 
regardful of words rather than love." Discipline, he points out, 
can never have its full force, till after it has found an 
opportunity of showing to the pupil his better self, by means 
of an approbation powerfully affecting him. In words of 
earnest warning, which both the too indulgent and too strict 
teacher may alike take to heart, Herbart repeatedly shows, 
that until this better self has been discerned by both teacher 
and pupil, blame can have no effect. "Reproof," says he, "falls 
on receptive ears, only when it has ceased to stand alone as a 
minus quantity ; it must only threaten to cancel an approbation 

1 Science of Education, p. 257. 

2 " The tutor's example must lead the child into what he would have 
him do. His practice must by no means cross his precepts, unkss he 
intends to set him wrong " [Thoughts on Education, Locke). "Remember 
that before you venture an undertaking to form a man, you must have 
made yourself a m,an ; you must find in yourself the example you ought 
to offer to him" (Emile, Rousseau). 



Moral Strength of Character ; Government and Discipline 173 

already won, for those alone feel the stress of inward reproaches 

who have attained to self-respect, and fear to lose something 

of it."* 

Children have at first no character; only by 
Genesis of . . 7 ■■, 

objective and degrees is one formed in their circle of thought. 

character in What they do or leave nndone, keep or give up, 
c * ren * suffer or refuse to suffer, is not regulated by moral 
principles. The commencement of this subordination to 
principles is simultaneous with the commencement of isolated 
general volitions, which have been formed out of several 
similar acts of will. These general volitions are the centres 
of crystallization in the fluid element of single willings, by 
which the latter are attracted and apperceived, if their 
nature admit of it. These general volitions, which determine — 
that is to say, apperceive or suppress— the single willings, 
form the beginning of what Herbart calls the subjective part of 
character. This consists of the will based on the intuitive 
judgments formed by the apperceiving masses of presentations. 
Opposite to it is what we have seen to be an earlier growth, 
the objective part, i.e., the single willings growing out of 
manifold desires. The subjective, as Herbart repeatedly 
proves, is the determining, the objective the determined, 
part of character. 

The extreme importance of instruction for the 
^instruction^ objective side of character, may be gathered from 
^character 6 wnat nas been already said on the nature of 
interest. The aim of instruction is to arouse many- 
sided interest, out of which grows a many-sided volition, and 
discipline " must form the frame of mind which makes such 
instruction possible." 2 In regard to the subjective side of 
character, the task common to both discipline and instruction is : 
first, to guard against the formation near or after each other 
of several ruling circles of thought : second, to ensure that 
unity of the ruling circle upon which memory of the will, the 
energy and sequence of volition peculiar to character, rests, 
which, forming a protection against the storms of passion, 

1 Science of Education, p. 238. 2 Ibid., p. 238. 



174 Introduction to Herbarfs Science and Practice of Education 

when combined with insight makes a man truly free. " Nothing 
is more evident," says Herbart, " than that the passionate man 
is a slave ; his incapacity to consider motives of duty or ad- 
vantage, his ruin through his own fault, are clearly evident. 
In contrast with him, the reasoning man, who represses his 
desires as soon as they are opposed by considerations of good, 
may rightly be called free, and the stronger he is in this power 
of repression, the freer he is." * 

" Direct formation of character " (discipline), says 

The relation of „... ,. , . ., • ■ • i 

discipline to Ziller, " must place the pupil in a position, and 

open up to his interest opportunities, where he can 

turn his thoughts into action on the lines of that interest." 

These opportunities must not however be so numerous that 
memory of the will, which it is " the work of discipline to 
complete," suffers. Memory of the will, it will be remembered, 
can only be formed when similar acts of will are often 
repeated. Hence the teacher ought to cultivate the child's 
will by discipline " in the midst of a simple uniform mode of 
life, and the absence of all disturbing change." 2 

In strictly ordered life, "where right," saj^s Goethe, " is not 
regarded as medicine, but as daily diet," steady, regularly 
recurring acts are possible, from which not desultory single 
willings, but the will of the individual, can be formed through 
the power of apperception. To this end, every willing must be 
in accord with memory ; that is to say, it must be such that 
there is no need to consider what its expression in action 
is to be, because that is in every case determined beforehand. 
" A man," says Herbart, " whose will does not spontaneously 
reappear as the same as often as the occasion recurs, a man 
who is obliged to carry himself back by reflection to his for- 
mer resolution, will have great trouble in building up his 
character. It is because natural constancy of will is not 
often found in children, that discipline has so much to do." 3 

Discipline must restrain, determine, regulate. 

^itcipiine^ Where there is no memory of the will, and its place 

is filled by caprice, discipline must both compel 

1 Lehrhuch zur Psychologies 119. 2 Science of Education, p. 242. 
3 Ibid., p. 203. 



Moral Strength of Character ; Government and Discipline 175 

and restrain the pupil, that his will may grow united and 
harmonious. Discipline must also work determiuingly. It 
must teach the pupil himself to choose, not the teacher in 
the name of the pupil, for the pupil's is the character to be 
determined. "When the subjective side of character begins to 
form, regulating discipline comes in. While reasoning should, 
according to Herbart, never be used with a child, directly the 
pupil can begin to reason, he should not be left entirely to him- 
self. The teacher must enter into his thoughts and difficulties, 
and guard against their taking a wrong direction. Finally, 
even if the pupil has reached the stage of moral resolution, 
he must through discipline, " by frequent reminders and 
warnings becoming ever more and more gentle," be helped 
to observe and correct what is faulty. Up to this point, " well- 
earned approbation, quietly but abundantly given out of a full 
heart, must be the spring upon which the force of an abundant, 
convincing, carefully apportioned blame must work. But when 
once seZ/-education has begun it must not be interfered with. 
When the time arrives that the pupil possesses both praise 
and blame within himself, and can guide and impel himself by 
their' means," 1 the work of discipline is done. 

1 Science of Education, p. 248. 



CHAPTER V 

THE RELATIONSHIP AND DEBT OF HERBART TO PESTALOZZI 1 

The history of human progress supplies us with the cheering 
fact that truth is indestructible. When an idea has a truth as 
its essence, the imperfections of its original embodiment are 
not only powerless to check its vitality and ultimate develop- 
ment, but are often a direct stimulus to both. 

There is no more striking instance of this than is supplied 
by Herbart's relationship to Pestalozzi. At first sight it 
would appear that, from the great differences of birth, tem- 
perament, and education between these two men, their points 
of contact must be necessarily few and superficial. On the 
one hand is the intuitively taught man of genius, who, by 
his own confession, had not read a single book for thirty 
years, whose only literary attempt to systematize his mode of 
teaching, Inquiry into the Course of Nature in the Develop- 
ment of the Human Race, was a signal failure, and who re- 
peatedly mourned over his " unpractical ideas," over " the 
.contradiction between his will and his power," and his " ina- 
bility to conduct the smallest village school " ; on the other 
hand is the man of learning, whose rare original power of 
analytical and abstract thought had been developed to perfec- 
tion by all that was most favourable in his home, in the school, 
and the university, and who was beginning to generalize his 
first successful experiences as a teacher into the principles of a 
new system of education. Such were Pestalozzi and Herbart, 
the former fifty-three, the latter twenty-three, years of age, 
when their first meeting took place at Burgdorf, a town not far 
from Berne, where Pestalozzi, fresh from "one of the most 

1 This chapter mainly appeared as an article in the Journal o r Educa- 
tion for May, 1892, and is here reprinted with the kind permission of 
the Editor. 

176 



The Relationship and Debt of Herbart to Pestalozzi 177 

memorable events in the history of education " — i.e., his five 
months' experiment at Sfcanz — was teaching the lowest class in 
the Citizens' School. Two years later Herbart described that 
meeting with generous enthusiasm ; he recognized the success 
of Pestalozzi's teaching, and discerned in it that which we have 
seen was to Herbart himself the great aim of instruction, i.e. 
its educative value, as proved by " the vigorous stability of 
mind " the children gained from it. " I saw him," wrote Her- 
bart, " in his schoolroom. A dozen children were assembled at 
an unusual hour in the evening." (Pestalozzi had summoned 
them for Herbart's inspection.) " I feared I should find them 
ill-tempered, should see the experiment I had come to witness 
fail ; but they came without a sign of rebellion, and their 
state was one of lively activity till the end. I heard the noise 
of the whole school speaking together — no, not a noise, but a 
harmony of words, extremely distinct, powerful as a choir 
keeping time like one, and withal so closely and distinctly con- 
nected with what had just been taught, that I felt some diffi- 
culty in restraining myself from passing from my role of 
spectator into that of a learning child. I watched to dis- 
cover possibly a silent or carelessly speaking child, but I 
found none. The intonation of these children pleased my ear, 
although their teacher had the most unintelligible voice 
imaginable, and their speech could ^not have been taught them 
by their Swiss parents. But the explanation was not far to 
seek. The rhythmic speech, pronounced simultaneously, pro- 
duced distinct articulation, the syllables could not be slurred 
over, each letter had its time, and thus the child, speaking 
steadily aloud with his natural strength of voice, found utter- 
ance for himself. Nor was the general and sustained attention 
a riddle to me. The mouth and hands of each child were 
occupied together ; inactivity and silence were imposed on 
none. Thus the need for distraction was done away with, and 
natural liveliness required no outlet, this way of learning to- 
gether needing none. I was delighted with the ingenious use 
of the transparent horn tablet with incised letters, on which 
the children's hands were steadily engaged, while they were 
learning by heart. A silent but dexterous master corrected 

N 



178 Introduction to Her barfs Science and Practice of Education 

their pencilled letters, and encouraged them to do better. 
Even now, when I draw diagrams for mathematical demon- 
strations on the blackboard, I reprove my hand for its inability 
to produce such firm straight lines, such perfect perpendiculars 
and accurate circles, as did these six-year-old children ; and 
I value far beyond this mere manual dexterity, the vigorous 
stability of mind which the children gain thus happily by 
keeping steadily to the idea of roundness, till the eager, pur- 
posing eye and the obedient hand slowly but surely complete 
the circle with a faultless curve." 

Herbart saw that once more in the world's history the truth 
had entered in at lowly doors. Perceiving the value of the 
principle of observation (Anschauung), " that grand idea," as he 
calls it, " of its discoverer the noble Pestalozzi," he afterwards 
made it the basis of one of his most important works (Uber 
Pestalozzi 's Idee einer ABC der Anschauung) ; through that 
work, the principle became one source of his great success as 
a mathematical teacher. " Pestalozzi," he writes, " has only 
worked out the application of the principle within the narrow 
sphere of elementary instruction. It belongs in truth to 
education as a wholej though it needs for that a further 
development." 

To such a work Pestalozzi was quite unequal. We are told 
he was ignorant of drawing, and scorned grammatical learn- 
ing. He was conversant with ordinary operations in arith- 
metic, but would have had difficulty in getting through a long 
sum in mul tiplication or division, and he probably had never 
tried to work out a problem in geometry. 1 This want of 
ordered knowledge and the circumstances of his environment 
combined to render him utterly incapable of such a task. His 
experiences and intuitions, which initiated a revolution in 
education, could accomplish wonderful things in the children 
immediately in contact with him, but his untrained mind 
could not work up those materials into a system. 

In applying the principle of observation — Anschauung — to 
mathematics, Pestalozzi's choice of the square as the type 

1 Life of Pestalozzi, by Roger de Guimps. 



The Relationship and Debt of Herbart to Pestalozzi 179 

figure, and Herbart's strictly reasoned rejection of the same 
and choice of the triangle in its place, illustrate at the very- 
beginning of their respective works, the different manner in 
which the uneducated and educated man made use of the 
idea. Again, Pestalozzi attempted to give in his ABC the 
elements of arithmetic as well as of form, while Herbart only 
treated arithmetic incidentally, and then for advanced pupils 
alone. The measurement of surface, too, to which Pestalozzi 
attaches so much importance, occupies with Herbart a sub- 
ordinate place. In its stead Herbart goes far deeper into 
mathematics, and really obtains by analysis phenomenal forms 
in space for the elements of his observation instruction. With 
his extended knowledge of psychology and mathematics, he 
did a work which Pestalozzi, theoretically ignorant of both, 
could not have attempted; the principle of Anschauung, which 
the Swiss philanthropist had divined rather than discovered, 
provides in the Grerman philosopher's application of it what 
may truly be called a prologue to mathematics. 

But Herbart always acknowledged that to Pestalozzi he 
was directly indebted for the idea which forms the basis of 
the work. .Further, he saw that there were essential elements 
of similarity between his own aim and that of this teacher 
of the poor. Both knew the supreme importance, and there- 
fore tried to find a true sequence of studies which should 
correspond to the advancing stages and parallel needs of the 
child's development. " To discover this sequence," writes 
Herbart, "is Pestalozzi's chief effort and likewise my own 
great ideal." And the fundamental belief which inspired the 
activity of both was one and the same. It was, that an edu- 
cation which gives the individual power to develop every 
faculty, intellectual and emotional, in the service of morality, 
is the one constant force which can elevate humanity. Hence 
recognizing Pestalozzi as a fellow-labourer in a great and 
common cause, Herbart tried to make his work known and 
valued amongst a class to which Pestalozzi himself had no 
access. 

Herbart's treatise on Pestalozzi's then recently published 
work, Wie Gertrud ihre Kinder lehrt, from which the descrip- 



180 Introduction to Herbart's Science and Practice of Education 

tion of his fir^t meeting with Pestalozzi is taken, was, in his 
own words, " written to help the readers of Pestalozzi's book to 
form a correct estimate of it." The treatise was addres.^ 
to the wives of three of Herbart's friends — viz., to "three 
mothers " in Bremen — and through them to all mothers of the 
upper classes. Its object was to show that, Pestalozzi's principle 
being of universal application, it ought not to be confined to 
the children of the poor, but should be known and intelli- 
gently used by mothers of every class. 

Pestalozzi, says Herbart to them, speaks of beggars' children. 
The ideal for their culture is supplied, he says, by agriculture, 
industry, trade, and these he will use instead of the usual 
wretched subjects of school instruction. His material must be a 
lever so stout that it will not break in clumsy hands. Perhaps 
you can hardly conceive his method can be of use to you. Let 
us see The most pressing needs are likewise the most uni- 
versal. He who tries to provide what is most necessary for 
all, has something to say to us also. 

What then is the most general, the most efficient, and there- 
fore the primary element in all instruction? Nature and 
human beings surround the child. The most important thing 
to secure is, that the daily experience they offer to the child, 
the boy, the youth, the man, shall always find open doors and 
beaten paths to head and heart, that it may stimulate tongue 
and hand to answer to each moment's need. How is this to 
be effected? It is true, nature and human beings seek of them- 
selves to find an entrance to the child through eye and ear ; 
but they often block that entrance by the very multiplicity, 
brightness, and variety of their objects. People speak too 
quickly; nature shows too many forms in one field, too many 
colours in one flower. All this confusion does in a manner 
penetrate the child, because he is impelled by the liveliest 
necessity, and he learns to speak, to see, to touch. But do you 
think, when he can express to some extent his physical wants, 
he can really see, speak, and understand? By no means. If 
he looks only so superficially at things as is necessary to dis- 
tinguish them from each other, is not the whole wealth of form 
with which nature surrounds him lost to him ? Do you think 



The Relationship and Debt of Herbart to Pestalozzi 181 

your children will care to study the outline, the size, of 
countries on the map, or will your boys learn with interest 
Btfktjtral history, technology, mechanics, geometry, physics, or 
"De well prepared for their handiwork, if they cease to cultivate 
the eye, as soon as it has learned to serve their primary needs ? 
It is just the same with speech. While then the need, the 
impulse, is in the child to articulate, to grasp the forms of 
things, at the period when he inquires the names of objects, 
and daily finds new ones which charm him into looking at 
them narrowly and from every side, then is the time, before 
this natural progress is at an end, when you must come to his 
help, and open out his sense for form and speech, that he may 
be able truly to see nature and receive thoughts. It is the eye 
which must first perceive objects before they can be named 
and talked about. Therefore practice in observation {An- 
schauung) is that primary, most effectual, most general prin- 
ciple of which we have been in search. Many have recom- 
mended its exercise, but Pestalozzi, so far as I know, was the 
first to insist that it, and it only, should occupy, as it ought, 
the first and foremost place. 

But not only did Herbart point out the intellectual import- 
ance of Pestilozzl's principle: he recognized and appreciated 
the noble simplicity of the man, and his boundless devotion to 
his self-chosen cause. He saw that Pesta.'ozzi, possessed with 
a sense of the misery and degradation of the poor, for whose 
relief his life was spent in unappreciated toil, had neither 
thought nor hope beyond their rescue, and these very limita- 
tions became in his kindly sight, a new reason for honouring 
and understanding the truth of his efforts and his purpose. 

" The salvation of the people, of the common rough folk," 
writes Herbart to these more favoured mothers, " is Pestalozzi's 
aim. For those who are the least cared for, he cares. In huts, 
not in your houses, he seeks his crown of reward. This kindly, 
lovable man of sixty years, who greets everything human with 
such gentleness, whose first word to the stranger seems to say, 
* Here he who deserves it will find a heart' — you mothers of 
the upper classes will not reproach him because, full of jain at 
the signs of the times and the misery of his fellow-men, he cuts 



1 82 Introduction to Herbart s Science and Practice of Education 

his way down, as one impelled by the enthusiasm of youth, to 
the lowest class of all, in order to teach its little children their 
letters, and pours out vehement words there, when a cool, 
accurate description of his method would be to its more wel- 
come and instructive. To give you useful advice is only a 
thing by the way to him. This will not prejudice you against 
him. You will surely be interested as easily, as happily, in 
all which the activity of such a man works upon and seeks to 
penetrate. And you must preserve this feeling while you 
study his work, or you will neither be able to recognize the 
purpose of his effort, nor rightly determine the use you can 
make of it." 

No less clearly did Herbart perceive what he would have 
termed the educative value, the moral influence, of Pestalozzi's 
instruction. By means of the senses it develops and perfects 
in useful exercise, that interest in things external to the child 
is generated, which Herbart taught was the true preventive 
of early selfishness and a preparation of the mind for the 
teacher's after-work. Such an interest fosters in the child a 
natural for^etfulness of self, and in so doing preserves " the 
childlike mind, the unconscious look straight into the world, 
which seeks nothing, and for that very reason sees what is to 
be seen." x The relation between his own and Pestalozzi's 
thought is very apparent in the following estimate by him of 
the ethical value of Pestalozzi's teaching : — 

"To promote the intercourse of a human being with his 
fellow-men is Pestalozzi's aim. Does he in this do anything for 
morality ? In silence perhaps just that is accomplished, which 
the moral lessons and pathetic stories written for children 
assume to be already existent. The ground is made ready for 
them where they can take root. The child, whose eye and ear 
are open to nature and his fellow-creatures, is diverted from 
his own manifold impressions, from his own pleasure or dis- 
comfort. Egoism is undermined in him, who attends not to 
himself, but to others and to the relationships of objects. Such 
an one is prepared to look at himself as one among many, and 

1 Science of Education, p. 246. 



The Relationship and Debt of Herbart to Pestalozzi 183 

hence will speedily find the place for which he is fitted. When 
this general outlook at the relationships of men has become the 
ruling direction of the mind, it leads spontaneously and in- 
fallibly to the love of order therein, and to the preservation of 
that order by law and custom. Afterwards, when the roots 
of moral feeling have grown, is the time to direct the child's 
attention to himself, that he may win self-control, analyze and 
purify his opinions with watchful criticism, and devote his 
powers to recognized ends." 



CHAPTER VI 

CONCLUSION. — SOME ASPECTS OF HERBART'S WORK AND 
CHARACTER 

1 Education is work ; and like every work, it has on the one 
hand its aim, on the other its means and obstacles. The aim 
of education raises us into the realm of the ideal ; its means 
and obstacles take us back into the land of the actual — yes, of 
the veriest commonplace. In all great men who have thought 
and written about education, from Plato to Fichte, there is the 
striving towards an ideal ; how, indeed, could it be otherwise ? 
Without an exalted aim, how could the spirit of the man bear 
to bend down to that of the child ; without the hope with 
which we look at the young, how could we conquer the cold- 
ness of the thought that, in spite of all effort, the world will 
remain as it is ? " * 

The teacher's work, the path of its progress, the difficulties 
and discouragements it meets with on its arduous way, the 
promise and hope of its great reward — Herbart's knowledge of 
these was gathered up by the combined force of enthusiasm 
and a rare ability, through the study and practical experiences 
of a lifetime. Not without interest, therefore, can it be to in- 
dicate in conclusion, what are the aspects of his work, and 
what the features of his character as revealed therein, which 
appeal to the intelligence and reverence of the true teacher. 

First, education was accepted and carried on by him, not 
merely as a duty or means of livelihood. Including these, it 
went far beyond them ; it was to him a chosen, a loved, a 
sacred task. " The offer of the whole treasure of accumulated 
research in a concentrated form to the youthful generation," 

1 Aphorismen zur Pddagogik, Herbart. 
184 



Conclusion.— Some Aspects of Herbarfs Work and Character 185 

says he, " is the highest service which man at any period of 
his existence can render to his successors." 

"The happiness of the teacher! He who seeks a happiness 
ontside the inner sanctuary of his own circle of ideas, which 
shall carry with it a reasonable delight, and not spring from 
chance, can gain it only from a work whose aim is the revela- 
tion of ideas to an existing intelligence." Few have main- 
tained so consistently and so highly as he, in deed and word, 
the beauty and dignity of the teacher's calling. 

Again, education was not to him, as to every other great 
modern thinker who has approached it, an outlying field 
wherein his mental powers were only active at intervals. It 
was the point towards which his great store of metaphysical, 
psychological, and ethical knowledge converged; it was the 
very focus of his activity. Half his adult life was chiefly 
spent in laying the scientific foundations of education, an 
important part of the other half in constructing it on that 
basis, in the light of his philosophy, into a scientific system. 
"For twenty years," he writes, " I have called to my aid meta- 
physics and mathematics, besides self-observation, experience, 
and experiments, in order only to lay the foundation of true 
psychologic knowledge. And the impulse to these not easy 
investigations was, and is, my conviction that a great por- 
tion of the enormous defects in our educational knowledge 
arises from the want of psychology." 

The preceding passage supplies one reason of Herbart's great 
success as a teacher — i.e., his knowledge of both the principles 
and practice of education. Science and empiricism, the theory 
and the art of teaching, both are indispensable to him who 
would surely and successfully guide the mind of another. 
Herbart's attempt to teach his students the art of education 
has been elsewhere described, and need only be alluded to here 
as the result of his conviction, that " education cannot be 
merely taught, but must be also demonstrated and practised." 
But his insistence that a knowledge of the art of education 
could never dispense with or supply any deficiency in the 
knowledge of its theory, is yet more emphatic, for he held it to 
be of piimary importance. To those who would base educa- 



1 86 Introduction to Herbarfs Science and Practice of Education 

tion on experience alone, he points out, the nature of educa- 
tional experience is such that it demands a great part of a 
lifetime for its growth and ingathering. " No one," he says, 
" has a right to speak of experience until the experiment is 
completed, until, above all things, the residuum has been 
accurately weighed and tested. In the case of educational 
experiments, this residuum is represented by the faults of the 
pupil when he has attained to manhood. Thus the time re- 
quired for one such experiment is at least half a human life." 
Experience must determine how and to what extent the prin- 
ciples of theoretic pedagogy can be utilized without injuring 
the personality of the pupil. " The true educator makes it a 
point of honour that the clear impression of the person, the 
family, the birth, and the nationality, may be seen un defaced 
in the man submitted to his will," and the knowledge of the 
pupil's individuality which can alone make this possible 
nothing but experience can supply. But, argues Herbart, only 
those who have mastered the science of education, can 
thoroughly understand how to collect, interpret, and use 
experience. " Nowhere," says he, " is philosophic breadth of 
vision so necessary as in teaching, where daily practice and 
individual experience, expressed in such a variety of ways, so 
greatly narrow its range of view. Thus a preparation for the 
art by the science is necessary, a preparation of the under- 
standing and the heart before entering on the work, in virtue 
oi which experience, which we can alone get by actual doing 
of the work, will yield to us its lessons. In practice only is 
the art learned, and tact, readiness, versatility, and skill 
acquired ; but art teaches by practice him alone who has pre- 
viously learned his science in thought, made it his own, formed 
himself by it, and predetermined the future impressions 
which experience ought to make on him." 1 

1 Herbart's insistence on the necessity of a scientific training for 
teachers may be considered with profit at the present moment, when 
the reproach that no training college for secondary schoolmasters 
exists in England is abont to be taken away by the opening of one in 
connection with the College of Preceptors. It is to te hoped, in the 
interests of English education, that it will not share the fate of its 
predecessor through the unwillingness of male teachers to recognize 



Conclusion. — Some Aspects of Herbarfs Work and Character 187 

In sharp contrast with Locke, who calls " instruction the 
least part of education," Herbart, on the basis of his psycho- 
logy, proves it to be the most important part. Locke, the 
utilitarian, with regard to intellectual education, separates 
distinctly from it the ethical side of culture, and places, like 
Herbart, the perfection of the latter — i.e., virtue, morality — as 
the great aim of education. Relegating intellectual culture to 
a secondary place and setting before it the lower aim of 
utility, Locke consistently calls instruction the least part of 
education. In doing so, he takes but little account of that 
relation between moral and intellectual enlightenment, which 
was to Herbart an indissoluble and intimate interaction, 
formed and maintained by instruction through its cultivation 
in the circle of thought, of both will and insight, the moral 
and intellectual in man. As the factor which determines, 
through the wealth and the nature of the presentations it sup- 
plies, the extent and perfection of this interaction, Herbart 
held instruction to be the most important part of education. 
Roughly speaking, the teacher is he who supplies the presen- 
tations, the material for the circle of thought, the pupil he 
who receives it, but there is a qualifying element in Herbart's 
conception of this relationship between teacher and pupil, 
which cannot be too clearly kept in view by those who would 
grasp its full significance. This element is the individuality 
of the pupil. The teacher's vast and noble work is to pene- 
trate the innermost core of the mind germ entrusted to his 
keeping, that he may, as it were, inoculate it with thoughts, 
feelings, and desires it could never otherwise have obtained, 
which when absorbed into itself will continuously help to 
guide and determine its after-growth. But in doing so he must 
respect the personality itself, and keep its better part intact. 
11 The teacher," says Herbart, " ought to make it a point of 
honour to leave the individuality as untouched as possible ; he 
ought to leave to it the only glory of which it is capable, 



the necessity of training, and their disinclination to accept those oppor- 
tunities for it, of which English women have made such extensive and 
eucctssl'ul use. 



1 88 Introduction to Herbarfs Science and Practice of Education 

namely, to be sharply defined and recognized even to con- 
spicuousness, that the specimen of the race may not appear 
insignificant by the side of the race itself and vanish as in- 
different." 

Closely bound up with the recognition of the supreme claim 
of the individuality to its own self-development, is Herbarfs 
conception of the ideal which the teacher must ever keep in 
sight from the beginning of his work to its end, viz., to develop 
in the pupil, through his own active self-doing, the knowleige 
and the use of ordered liberty. " A making," he says, " which 
the pupil himself discovers when choosing the good and re- 
jecting the bad — this or nothing is formation of character." 
Only so far as the teacher " places the power already existent^ 
and in its nature trustworthy, under such conditions that it 
must infallibly and surely accomplish this rise to self-conscions 
personality," does he perform his work aright. The greater 
the ability of the teacher who neglects to appeal to and 
strengthen this power by constant use, the greater, according 
to Herbart, will be the extent of his failure. Such a teacher 
was Fenelon. " Through his ability, he was too successful in 
his educational apostleship. Under his hand, the ablest, says 
St. Simon, that ever was, the Duke de Bourgogne, became a 
pale copy of his master. Fenelon had monopolized and absorbed 
the will of his pupil." 1 Far other was that ideal which 
Herbart kept before himself throughout his life, and expressed, 
when a young teacher, to his first pupils in these words : " No 
human power ought to be crippled ; all ought to advance to 
perfection under the protection and gentle rule of the moral 
law." The pupil of Fenelon was as the image and superscription 
of his master, accurate and clear, cast by him in his own mould. 
The pupil of Herbart was as a ship able to adapt itself to every 
change of wind and wave, steered towards its goal at first by 
the teacher's hand, and afterwards by the cultivated and self- 
won power of the pupil himself. 

So far as to the aspects of Herbart's work. Certain features 
of his character are specially noticeable as revealed therein. 

1 History of Pedagogy, by Gabriel Compayre. 



Conclusion. — Some Aspects of Herbarfs Work and Character 189 

First, that which he set up as the immediate aim of in- 
trusion— many-sided interest — he realized and perfected in 
himself. The reader will find abundant evidence in his works 
of his interest arising from knowledge, empirical, specula- 
tive, and aesthetic ; his interest arising from sympathy, whether 
with individuals, with society, or with religion, was a hardly 
less prominent characteristic. His relationship to Pestalozzi, 
described in the preceding chapter, is one instance among 
many wherein were combined elements of both interests 
which passed into fruitful thought and act. That he could 
recognize and appropriate the idea of a teacher on such a 
different plane of culture from himself as Pestalozzi, and 
afterwards apply it in a direction and to a degree never 
dreamed of by its originator, is an instance of his intellectual 
many-sidedness. That he could see with discriminating in- 
sight and generous enthusiasm, and attempt to make others 
see, this loftiness of Pestalozzi's ideal and the ethical value of 
his teaching, is a no less striking instance of his large-hearted 
and many-sided sympathy. 

But by far the most prominent feature of his character was 
his reverence, his passion for truth. 

M To penetrate the sacred depths of truth, 
To strive in joyful hope for human weal, 
Was his life's aim." 

These words, engraven on his tombstone, contain the history of 
his life, and they are the central thought of all that has been 
worthily written in his memory. This reverence for truth 
was fed by all the forces of his intellectual and moral nature. 
His absorbing desire for it, combined with his firm belief 
that an overruling Providence had given the power of dis- 
covering it to humanity, produced in him that steadfast will 
which never swerved from its pursuit in an age whose sprit 
was opposed to the course of his thought. That philosophic 
inquiry must be absolutely independent of all which is ex- 
ternal to the necessary course of thought, was to him an 
inevitable presumption of scientific investigation. Hence he 
could not understand the efforts contemporary philosophers 
made to defend their position against attacks and criticisms 



190 Introduction to Hcrbarfs Science and Practice of Education 

based on subjective feeling or on external authority. Still 
less could he understand those newer speculative systems 
which made what they called speculative theology their main 
centre. For the same penetration which showed him so 
clearly the necessary conditions of investigation and verifica- 
tion, showed him also, that there were regions where such con- 
ditions cannot obtain, and hence where no exact knowledge is 
possible. His efforts, so visible in his writings, to free philo- 
sophy from the influence of theology were caused by his belief 
that, while theology could at best do little to forward philo- 
sophy, its general tendency was to hinder and even oppose 
the course of philosophical research. But they were also 
caused by his abiding conviction, that the nature of the subject 
of religious belief made it an impossible object for specula- 
tive inquirjr. Beyond the region of the known and the know- 
able still unknown, he felt the unknowable, an infinite the 
human mind could not measure, but whose outskirts it could 
only touch by subjective effort, the results of which effort, 
being incapable of objective proof, could never claim universal 
validity. Allowing this conviction its full force in deter- 
mining the unpassable boundaries of his philosophic inquiries, 
he separated himself from one important side of the thought of 
his time. But he preserved what was to him the life-blood of 
his mind, its integrity, and in so doing satisfied then, as ever, 
that passion for truth to which he dedicated his whole and 
willing service. 

But it was in that ultimate Reality which can neither be 
apprehended by the senses nor reached alone by the reason 
that Herbart sought and found the full answer to his hope and 
love. In his own words, " his mind kept Sabbath in religion." 
He " turned to it " not as knowledge, but as hope, founded on 
what he held to be the evidence of design in nature, " for rest 
from all thoughts, desires, and cares." 1 And this he did, not 
with the exclusiveness of the philosopher, but with the evor- 
present sense that religion was a universal response in a variety 
of tongues to the common need of man. Memorable, when 

1 Science of Education, p. 175. 



Conclusion. — Some Aspects of Herbarfs Work and Character 191 

taken in this connection, are the words which, as the honoured 
successor of one of the greatest thinkers of modern times, he 
spoke in his memory, " Religion is older than any earthly 
wisdom; the need of it is born with every child of man, and 
the invisible Lord receives with equal goodness all hearts 
which dedicate themselves to Him." * 

In his Rede fiber Fichte's Ansicht der Weltgeschichte there is 
on the one hand this fervent belief in a Divine order of the 
world, on the other the veracity of thought which perceived 
that the belief, which was a great reality to him, could be 
exhibited to other minds as hypothesis only. The cause 
which Herbart believed to underlie phenomena could not be 
observed by human faculties ; hence he knew the assumption 
of such a cause could only commend itself for acceptance to 
other minds, to the extent to which it succeeded in explaining 
diverse facts, or in reducing partial laws to harmony. Fichte 
had called the century in which they lived " the age of com- 
pleted sinfulness." This age, said Fichte, in consolation and 
explanation, is a necessary transition from the period when 
men were guided by a reason acting as instinct, to another 
when they will have learned, as the lesson of their long errors 
and wanderings, to answer of their own free will to the guid- 
ance of reason. To Herbart a theory which consciously sacri- 
ficed one generation of men to another, was a false explanation 
of the world, and as such he rejected it. His conviction was 
" that humanity is good in its essence, and that the true 
earthly preparation for a future higher state of existence is 
never wanting to any race or age." But he carefully points out 
to his hearers that the theory he offers as substitute contains 
no more knoiuledge than the one rejected. That which had 
become to him a truth of belief must be judged by others by 
its power to explain and reconcile phenomena. " The conso- 
lation for ' this age of sinfulness ? is to be found rather in the 
old idea that the earthly life is a school for the immortal soul, 
not for the race, but for every individual, of which no one is 
sacrificed for another, as in Fichte's theory of earlier generations 

1 Rede gehalten an Geburtstage KanV&, April 22nd, 1810. 



192 Introduction to Herbarfs Science and Practice of Education 

sunk in sin, that later ones may attain to knowledge and art. 
Far otherwise run the lessons of history, and, as I am bound 
to add, the teaching of philosophy. History, never concealing, 
but plainly revealing, all the crooked ways along which mankind 
has passed, sometimes madly rushing, sometimes slowly creep- 
ing, says nothing of a world-plan, according to which all were 
compelled from the beginning to move straight forwards, or at 
least in one and the same devious line appointed by law. All 
the more clearly and emphatically, however, does history show 
us ever and always the same humanity, with the same need^, 
the like passions, only with variations explicable through 
different modes of life, knowledge, and purposed culture. A 
psychologic unity and obedience to law is herein apparent ; it 
comes of itself freely to meet philosophy, which discovers as 
a necessity just the same obedience to law, with small and 
slow changes, due to the increase of ideas and insight, as well 
as to the growth and decay of error and passion. In the old 
and the uniform, in that which always repeats itself during 
immeasurable centuries with some progress, lies the nature of 
man, and therein must we seek for the gifts of God. Accord- 
ing to the Divine order, man comes helpless into the world, but 
capable of cultivation by language, family, reciprocal needs, 
accumulated experience, discovered arts, existing science, the 
works of genius from all preceding ages, which, the longer 
their duration, must the more uniformly influence ages to come. 
Humanity becomes ever more matured, living on always under 
the same sun, on the same earth. The salutary powers by 
means of which it ripens are, although the least observed, ever 
the same and ever active. The changing fortunes of humanity 
are like the mountains on the earth's surface. They show as 
little regularity as those mountains, and vainly do we try to 
imagine it. But the sphere of the earth is as a whole well 
rounded, and human history, the longer its course, cannot fail 
to trace ever more clearly and distinctly that straight line 
which it must traverse according to psychologic laws, under 
conditions ordered in the beginning by God." 1 

1 Rede iiher Fielders A nsicht der Welf.gescJrichte, from Hartenstein'9 
edition of Herbarfs Sammtliche Werke, vol. xii. p. 247. 



Conclusion.— Some Aspects of ' Her barf s Work and Character 193 

Herbart's theory of the order of the world contained in the 
preceding passage is compressed by him into his pregnant 
saying, " Humanity educates itself continuously by the circle of 
thought which it begets." x In the order of nature, as learned 
and interpreted by the developing faculties of man, he saw a 
divine provision for the education of the race ; he saw, too, that 
the true teacher, as the interpreter of that order, moves forward 
as a co-worker with Providence under the divine sanction and 
aid. In this progress lay his hope for humanity, in its power 
to forward this progress, his faith in education. 

1 Science of Education^ p. 93, 



Cloth. 268 pages. $1.00. 



THE 

SBcicncc of Bbucation; 

Its General Principles Deduced from its Aim, 

AND 

THE ESTHETIC RE V ELATION OF THE WORLD. 

BY 

JOHANN FRIEDRICH HERBART, 

Professor of Philosophy at the University of Gottingen. 

Translated from the German, with a Biographical Introduction by 
HENRY M. and EMMIE FELKIN, 

AND A 

Preface by OS&AR BROWNING, M.A., Fellow of King's College, Cambridge. 



OPINIONS OF THE PRESS. 

K Mr. and Mrs. Felkin have earned the gratitude of the educa- 
tionists of this country" in presenting this admirable translation of 
some of the greatest of the works on a great subject." — The Scotsman. 

"Exceptionally well executed. Herbart was without doubt the 
most important of the post-Kantian philosophers of Germany, with 
the exception of Hegel, and although more than half a century has 
elapsed since he left us, his ideas, corresponding in some degree with 
those of Mill and Bain and Spencer among ourselves, have been of 
the nature of those that have most powerfully influenced our age. 
We are unquestionably the better, having a book like this thrust upon 
/ur attention— a book written by one of the few really great theorists 
on education. The volume is a valuable addition to our gradually 
growing educational library." — The Glasgow Herald. 

"The work is of enormous value. It will supply a foundation 
on which a real science of education may be built. The book has 



been admirably translated by Mr. Henry Felkin and Mrs. Felkin." 
— Westminster Review. 

"To adopt the words of Emerson, many people, indeed all but a 
handful, would 'as soon think of swimming across Charles River 
to go to Boston,' as of reading Herbart in the original, now that 
there is so careful and exact an English translation as this of Mr. 
and Mrs. Felkin. This is a book of thoughts, of Herbart's thoughts ; 
and the nearness with which a reader is brought to him, even the 
word-for-word nearness, is often helpful, not to say essential. It is 
not superfluous to repeat one's word of thanks to the translators for 
what must have been anxious and laborious work." — The Academy. 

" Full of facts and suggestions that will prove most valuable to all 
responsible, whether as guardians or schoolmasters, for the educa- 
tional training of others. The whole work should be carefully studied 
by the historian of education as well as by the practical teacher ; to 
both it will be most serviceable." — The AthencEum. 

" In brief, this is a book for every teacher to read in with profit, 
but it is a book that few teachers will care even to read through. Sit 
down to it and you are dismayed ; glance through it and you are 
delighted with the wisdom it contains." — Educational Review. 

"Now that this Science of Education is restored to light it should 
be in every library of educational works for reference and comparison. 
We are therefore doubly grateful to Mr. and Mrs. Felkin for their 
public-spirited labours, and congratulate them on their result." — 
Educational Times. 

" Every page of his work breathes the true spirit of teaching. A 
work of this character is invaluable in the hands of tutors and 
masters of method. It leads one into the true science of teaching, 
and must exert a strong influence towards the destruction of false 
and shallow conceptions of the pedagogic art." — Schoolmaster. 

"The volume is full of philosophy of the deepest interest, and con- 
tains much of Herbart's best thought. Herbart's system may not be 
possible of adoption in its entirety under any circumstances, but 
those afforded by tuition, under which conditions he, of course, prac- 
tised it, but many of the broad principles would greatly benefit the 
pupils in our large schools." — Nottingham Guardian* 

D. C. HEATH & CO., Publishers, Boston, New York, Chicago. 



Herbartian School, and worked out on tl 
jmber of teachers for adoption in the Mu 



Concentration 



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l.iniyuiHjt: rind Vi-thoijriiphii. — Continuation of tht 
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